Pockets is a community arts and theatre company growing out of Leeds in West Yorkshire. Unpacking the world with pocket size theatre.

I work freelance across various areas in arts and culture, including theatre directing, community arts, and independent evaluation. I am currently evaluating the Holmfirth Arts Festival (2024) and recently evaluated Barnsley Youth Theatre’s first Arts Council England-funded project, Creepy Campfire Tales (2023), which led to my appointment as a trustee. I serve as a Senior Evaluation Consultant with the Tricolor Collective, where I evaluate large-scale national heritage projects. I will soon… Show more I work freelance across various areas in arts and culture, including theatre directing, community arts, and independent evaluation. I am currently evaluating the Holmfirth Arts Festival (2024) and recently evaluated Barnsley Youth Theatre’s first Arts Council England-funded project, Creepy Campfire Tales (2023), which led to my appointment as a trustee. I serve as a Senior Evaluation Consultant with the Tricolor Collective, where I evaluate large-scale national heritage projects. I will soon work independently with The Art House in Wakefield as a researcher and evaluator for a Baring Foundation-funded project.As the founder of Pockets Theatre CIC, I have led numerous projects emphasizing local stories and LGBTQ+ stories. Recently, I produced KALIEDOSCOPE, a series of scratch nights in Leeds and Bradford supporting local queer artists. I also produced Wolfenden (2017), an R&D project on LGBTQ+ history, and directed if the girls start moving (2017), a play about Leeds’ LGBTQ+ histories at Leeds Pride Weekend in the Corn Exchange. Other notable projects include Be Just and Fear Not (2016), highlighting local LGBTQ+ stories in Pudsey, Food For Thought (2017), a schools workshop on food sustainability in partnership with Fairandfunky, and SCRAPTASTIC Adventure (2016-2017), holiday workshops for young people also in partnership with Fairandfunky.My directing experience includes Algebra by Stuart Crowther at Unity Theatre (2021/2023), Oliver with Front Room Productions in the historic Leeds Market (2016/2017), and Twas The Night Before Christmas (2017), a children’s show touring regional venues. I also worked as a project assistant and actor in HD100 (2016) with Chol Theatre, and as youth director for The Everyday Heroes of Ashton (2014), a large-scale community performance in Ashton-under-Lyne.I have worked with organisations such as Leeds Playhouse, Stage@Leeds, Chol Theatre, Red Ladder Theatre, Front Room Productions, and Faceless Arts Show less

Responsible for:- It’s For You: Comic Relief funded outreach project for isolated older people, particularly older members of the LGBTQ+ community, men who live alone, and refugees and asylum seekers. - Creative Cultures: creative project for older people working across language differences.- Conversation Café: weekly drop in sessions for refugees and asylum seekers.- Heydays: day to day support, largest and oldest project of it’s kind at a UK theatre.

Publications:McKay, S. & Bradley, J. (2016). How does arts practice engage with narratives of migration from refugees? Lessons from ‘utopia’. Arts and Communities, Special Edition Arts, Activism and Human Rights, 8(1-2), pp.31-46.Conferences and Seminars (Selected):(With Fran Wyburn) Refereed conference workshop: ‘Migration and Settlement’. Connected Communities Conference, Co-creating Cities and Communities, Bristol, UK. (July 2017).Invited colloquium… Show more Publications:McKay, S. & Bradley, J. (2016). How does arts practice engage with narratives of migration from refugees? Lessons from ‘utopia’. Arts and Communities, Special Edition Arts, Activism and Human Rights, 8(1-2), pp.31-46.Conferences and Seminars (Selected):(With Fran Wyburn) Refereed conference workshop: ‘Migration and Settlement’. Connected Communities Conference, Co-creating Cities and Communities, Bristol, UK. (July 2017).Invited colloquium presentation: ‘Radical Self-Sabotage’. Participation: A Pause for Thought, University of Leeds, UK. (May 2017).(With Jessica Bradley) Invited research seminar: ‘How does arts practice engage with narratives of migration from refugees and asylum seekers? Lessons from ‘utopia’’. Performance and Cultural Industries Postgraduate Research Seminar, University of Leeds, UK. (May 2017).Refereed symposium presentation: ‘Welcome in Utopia: Representation and Welcome’. TaPRA PGR annual symposium, ‘Space For/Places In’, University of Leeds, Leeds, UK. (February 2017).Refereed conference presentation: ‘Welcome: Utopian Methodologies and Epistemologies’. Utopia and Connected Communities, The British Library, London, UK. (December 2016).Invited research seminar: ‘Spaces of Representation after ‘Can the Subaltern Speak’’. Performance and Cultural Industries Postgraduate Research Seminar, University of Leeds, UK. (April 2016).Teaching (University of Leeds, undergraduate modules, Theatre and Performance BA):PECI1704 Exploring Performance: Cultures and ContextsPECI3700 Independent Research ProjectResearch projects:Knowledge Exchange Consultancy – Mapping and reporting impact and outward facing activity at Leeds Trinity University, Institute of Childhood an Education.Migration and Settlement: Extending the Welcome, as a project manager and researcher (2017).Migration and Home: Welcome in Utopia, as a volunteer researcher (2016). Show less