Jess de Wahls

Jess de Wahls is an East German-born textile and embroidery artist based in South London. She received media attention in 2021 when the Royal Academy announced it would be removing her work following complaints of alleged transphobia, then days later apologised and retracted. Her work focuses on what she terms 'Retex (recycled textile) sculpting', her art concerning itself with gender equality, as well as recycling.

de Wahls's work attracted widespread media attention in 2021 when the Royal Academy of Arts removed her work from its gift shop following complaints of alleged transphobia by eight people, before apologising and reversing the decision. The incident became the focus of a wider discussion about freedom of expression in the arts. The Academy’s secretary and chief executive, Axel Rüger, later apologised to de Wahls, and the decision to remove the work from sale was described as a failure of communication. The UK culture secretary, Oliver Dowden welcomed the apology, saying: "Freedom of expression is central to great art and culture and should always be protected."

Prior to 2019 she ran a small hairdressing salon out of the cabaret dressing room at the Soho Theatre.

de Wahls was commissioned by the Artichoke Trust in 2018 to create a work for PROCESSIONS' '100 years 100 Banners' together with Women for Refugee Women. Her work remains on display in the 'Women Making History' exhibition as the Trust says the banners project is "notable for its diversity and inclusivity".

In 2017 she created a feminist embroidery workshop project titled Big Swinging Ovaries. It ran out of the Tate Modern in London and also toured Australia.

de Wahls grew up in East Berlin and moved to the UK in 2004. Her work features embroidery weaving together feminism and plant life. In her art she explores subjects such as the environment, contemporary feminism, female liberation, misogyny, gender inequalities and fetishism and employs creative textile recycling as part of her practice.

de Wahls was born in East Berlin in 1983. Her mother worked as a secretary and her father in a radiator factory. After reunification both her parents took jobs as prison warders. She has a 'gender non-conforming' father who enjoys dressing in women's clothing. de Wahls has said of him: "My father doesn't do labels other than sometimes jokingly calling himself a paradise bird."