About Joy

I come from Manchester, UK and now live in Torrox, Malaga, Southern Spain. I always had a secret passion for art! At the age of 13 I won a painting competition which validated my passion. However, for many years I had to keep it under wraps until I couldn’t hold it in any longer. After a very sad and dramatic event in my early 20’s the only way I felt I could heal was to paint. With a new set of watercolours, I began my adventure into really learning to paint.

From my own experience I know the value I gained from starting to paint.

MY INSPIRATION

The English artist William Turner became my ‘mentor’ I would study his work with a vengeance, after many failed attempts at copying some of his paintings I slowly began to grasp and understand lights and shades, colour and contrasts, perspective, and composition and structuring a painting.

PAINTING GIVES YOU A NEW SENSE OF PURPOSE

This paid off as entering, another competition in a gallery in Manchester UK, to my great surprise I won! With a new boost of confidence and purpose I applied as a mature student and succeeded at getting a place at Manchester Art College to do a foundation course which was a total game changer!

An introduction to abstract art and oil painting, acrylic wasn’t easily available in those days if at all, opened a whole new world and I was in heaven! It was an amazing year of learning.

TIME TO PICK UP A BRUSH AND START PAINTING AGAIN

Like many of us personal challenges can force us to change direction. Many years passed when I could only paint as a hobby rather than a career, however, life changed again when I moved to Spain in 2000. I set up a studio and a new life began. I was asked by many people if I would teach them to paint and that grew into having classes and workshops. I was taken on by a gallery and paintings started to sell, I held many exhibitions, my last exhibition was held in the CAC Picasso Museum just outside Malaga in 2019, and then the pandemic happened.

My classes are now online and my art gallery is my website!

Discover for yourself how painting can enhance your life. Whether you are just starting out or already paint my classes will inspire you to enjoy your own creativity.

Nature never ceases to inspire me, I’m surrounded with a gallery of beauty, the mountains and their ever changing colours, the light, the sea, the landscape. And my students who are a constant source of inspiration for which I’m very grateful for!

Painting sooths your soul and gives you the chance to reconnect, it deepens your awareness of your own creativity and also increases your appreciation for the beauty of life.

I know how much connecting to my creativity has helped me and when I'm teaching it's not just about art but about encouraging students to connect to their own creativity and self discovery.