Jenny van den Broeke

Jenny graduated with a degree in Animation from St. Joost School of Art & Design, Breda, in 2006. A year earlier, she co-founded Studio APVIS. The directors of this Breda- and Amsterdam-based film collective aim to push the boundaries of film and to seek out crossover collaborations. Jenny has thirteen years’ experience working as director and producer on various projects, both commissioned and independent.

In 2013 Jenny directed the short documentary film Blind Love. The film posed a question: ‘How do you find love when you cannot see?’ The audience experiences the world through the eyes of someone who does not see – and feels, as it were, with their eyes. The film, Jenny’s debut as a documentary filmmaker, won the Special Jury prize at Austin Film festival, among other prizes. But more importantly, the film was distributed by Dokkino, a Finnish film event for children at sixteen schools. The event aims to produce meaningful film experiences through showings and an educational programme. Blind Love’s programming addressed the social inclusion of disabled young people.

Following Dokkino, Jenny sought to apply artistic work in the social domain. In 2017 she made a VR experience, Far Inside, in cooperation with writer Karin Anema. Far Inside concerns the life story of Ton, the protagonist of Anema’s book, Today I Will Buy All the Colours. In the book, Ton recounts his lifelong struggle with schizophrenia and psychosis. In the VR installation, the visitor can experience a loss of control over the world around them, sharing the tremendous loneliness that Ton has felt, living in isolation and with fear of stigma. This VR installation is used as part of a workshop that was developed by Karin Anema for use in social contexts. It works here as a conversation-opener, raising questions about real contact and the reasoning behind misunderstood behaviour.

At Border Sessions, an art-tech festival in The Hague, Jenny worked beside sociologist Xiomara Vado Soto and Tim van Deursen one of the organizers of Hack the Planet, on ‘Building a VR Empathy machine lab’, which engaged with the perspectives of high-impact crime offenders. Participants from different backgrounds worked on VR prototypes. The project delivered valuable insights which may, in turn, lead to policy development and improved interactions with convicted youths.

Since 2009, Jenny has been working as a tutor at St. Joost School of Art & Design. She lectures on topics including digital storytelling, immersive storytelling, illustrated and animated visual storytelling, within the Arts & Interaction minor programme. She is propedeuse in the Photography, Film & the Digital department.

As a CARADT researcher, Jenny focuses on situated design, situated learning, immersive storytelling and misunderstood behaviour.

Alongside her work at the academy and her own practice, Jenny is an external trainer on the Visual Communication module at the Ministry of General Affairs. She lives in ‘s Hertogenbosch.