Jeanne Wilde

About Jeanne Wilde

Aurore Henny Smets, also known as Jeanne Wilde, is a London-based writer, composer, filmmaker, singer, and multi-instrumentalist whose multidisciplinary work blends music, literature, cinema, and anthropology.

As a songwriter and composer, she has written, produced, and released over 130 original songs .
From performing in Berlin, London, and Paris, to playing at renowned festivals and iconic venues including The Dublin Castle, the Camden Club, the Phoenix Arts Club, The Fiddler's Elbow, Le Chat Noir, The New Morning; she is known for her remarkable ability to improvise effortlessly with the audience's input, at length and across any genre, she attributes this skill to her synaesthesia, experiencing music visually, as if watching a film. For her, composing is a form of cinematic storytelling.

As an author, Jeanne has written two plays in French, La Planète Idéale and Dorian, an adaptation of The Picture of Dorian Gray, from which her stage name pays homage to Oscar Wilde.

She has also published two books. Her first, Tout est Possible, is an autobiographical novel she describes as a self-fulfilling prophecy, written as a tool for self-awareness and recovery from a substance use disorder.
Her second book, 2025: What Do We Do Now?, takes the form of an imagined interview with the ghost of David Foster Wallace and explores the meaning of existence and humanity’s evolving relationship with artificial intelligence.
With a background in anthropology, Jeanne has conducted and published four fieldwork studies: an immersion in the Buddhist monastery of Wu Wei Si in China; an analysis of Thangka painting practices in Dharamsala, India; a study of collective creativity within the artistic community Mix’Art Myrys in Toulouse; and a research project at LAAS-CNRS examining how scientists structure their work and arrive at discovery.
Jeanne is also the creator of a series of short films dedicated to building resilience through creative methods, blending artistic practice with psychological insight. Her work often highlights the transformative power of creativity, which she credits as central to her own healing journey from past CPTSD.