Matthews, Joy

Joy returned to art in 2015 after a teaching career in Halifax. Building on previous experience with drawing and watercolour, she started working in acrylic, and has focused her interest on figure painting. She has been enjoying a renewed relationship with watercolour as well as with paper collage. Most recently, Joy has been exploring photographic art and the surprises and discoveries that come with image cropping and editing.

Deriving subject matter from the people and places in Nova Scotia, and from her travels, Joy draws inspiration from natural forms and from the extraordinariness of ordinary people, places and things. Her paintings exhibit a passion for colour, an attention to light, shadow, and composition, and an appreciation of the beauty that surrounds us.

Joy received the Pauline Manning Award (First in Show) and the Best in Category for Figures at the Contemporary Art Society of Nova Scotia juried show in 2019. In 2018, she received the Honourable Mention Award for Landscapes at the CAS juried show.