Our Story

Jelly is an energetic collaboration of artists supporting each other and the wider community; acting as a catalyst and making space for art in the everyday.

Playing a strategic role in Reading's cultural development working to improve access to visual arts for all. We support and develop visual artists, building pathways towards careers in the creative industries and providing freelance opportunities.

We advocate for artists, improving access to the arts and strengthening the opportunities for emerging and established artists, especially those who may face barriers.

Since 1993, Jelly has moulded and shaped to fit different spaces, adapting & changing to inhabit a space (that is not always a building or venue) to work collaboratively with artists, other cultural organisations, partners and the wider community locally and internationally.

The support we bring is both nurturing and inspiring, experimental and challenging but always comes from a starting point of creative excellence.

We listen. We are here for those who recognise they need us and here for those who think they don’t. We are strategic. We adapt, evolve, change and reinvent. We are here to contribute to making our society a more creative one.

We will elevate and celebrate creative work and give it a platform to be seen and heard.

In 2022 we became an Arts Council England NPO (National Portfolio Organisation).

We are a community, always embedded within Reading town centre. Our current home is within a shopping centre in Reading’s main high street. Our work can be found throughout the town as public art or in spaces we go to deliver workshops such as schools, community centres, corporate venues and festival sites.

We are an outward looking organisation built on valuing people. Each person, both artist and participant, young and old, brings a unique perspective to our creative conversation.

We are a partner of the CVAN South East network