Owens was awarded a 3Arts fellowship to Ragdale and also won an award from the African American Arts Alliance for distinction in the Visual Arts during 2009. Joyce Owens has had her work selected for exhibitions on three continents: Monrovia, Liberia, Ethiopia, Georgetown, Guyana and Brussels, Belgium and has been in exhibitions around the United States. She was included in a special auction at ACA Gallery to support Faith Ringgold's foundation.
Her work has been shown in New York at the Black Fine Arts show, represented by the Parish Gallery in D.C., and Gallery Guichard in Chicago and Artjaz Gallery in Philadelphia. She was in a two-person exhibition at the Parish Gallery in January 2009 that honored Barack Obama. Photographer Bobby Sengstacke and Owens presented "From Slavery to Freedom: A Tribute to Obama" during the time of the presidential inauguration.
Also know as Joyce Owens Anderson, she is presently the Curator of the Galleries Program at Chicago State University.
Joyce Owens is a painter and she also creates sculptural works and masks. Owens earned a Master of Fine Arts (MFA) degree from Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. Her main influences there were Lester Johnson and Bernard Chaet. Others who guided her at Yale were Willie Ruff, musician, artists William Bailey and Al Held. Her undergraduate degree, Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA), was conferred by Howard University in our nation’s capitol, Washington, D.C., where she studied with preeminent African American artists and scholars including David Driskell, the historian and curator of the Bill and Camille Cosby Collection, the late Lois Mailou Jones, internationally known painter, Ed Love, sculptor and Owens’ mentor until his premature death, historian and painter Dr. James Porter and printmaker and painter, James L. Wells. California artist Leo Robinson was an important guide during my undergraduate years as well Lila Asher and Lloyd McNeil.
Owens has been sought out to jury fine art exhibitions and art fairs at the Museum of Science and Industry, The DuSable Museum and The New East Side Art fair to name a few. She has been a curator for many successful shows and an arts facilitator/consultant putting together artists with events. Owens is a knowledgeable arts panelist who has also developed discussion topics for galleries at Columbia College in Chicago, The Carver Museum in Austin, Texas and more. Owens has taught studio painting and drawing classes at Chicago State University for the past ten years while also maintaining an active exhibition career. She has been sitting on the Advisory Committee for the Department of Cultural Affair’s Chicago Artists Month since 2002. Owens is an associate editor for The Journal of African American History and on the Advisory Board of Woman Made Gallery in Chicago.
In college Owens was the art editor for Howard’s literary magazine for several years. She won the Student Council Award in Painting and The Special Talent Grant for three years, paying her tuition. She was also on the Dean’s list. While still an undergraduate McGraw-Hill hired Ms. Owens to illustrate two children’s books.
Joyce Owens is originally from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and attended Germantown High school where she excelled in art and was selected to be the editor of her high school year book among her other varied activities. She attended art classes at Philadelphia High School for Girls and Tyler School of Art on Saturdays. During her summers off, Ms. Owens worked as a camp counselor, becoming the Arts and Crafts Director for William Penn Camp when she graduated from Howard. During a summer after graduation she worked in a city of Philadelphia arts program with, now presidential portrait painter, Simmie Knox.
Owens taught art in a Philadelphia public school called the Franklin House. This facility was available to behaviorally disturbed students. Ms. Owens learned to teach reading in addition to art when she became aware of the need for more trained personnel in that area.
While a graduate student at Yale Ms. Owens was an art consultant teaching art in a public school program. She was also asked to create art for the Yale literary magazine and a poster for the historic Whiffenpoofs. At graduation she was selected the class marshall and won the Helen Winternitz Award in Painting.
Ms. Owens used her creative imagination to produce local programming for television in Philadelphia at the, then, CBS owned and operated station, WCAU. John Facenda, the voice of the NFL, was the talent for her broadcasts. Owens later moved to Chicago and worked for CBS in many capacities, finally becoming the station’s Graphics Coordinator for News. Ms. Owens left CBS after eight years to pursue her art career and start a family.
During the early child-rearing years her artistic output slowed. Among the few exhibitions Owens entered was the annual Black Creativity juried exhibition at the Museum of Science and Industry. Her work was included and received a cash award from sculptor and juror for the exhibition, Martin Puryear. She also won Best of show from head juror, Madeline Rabb, the former Director of the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs.
After presenting a solo exhibition at Chicago State University Owens was asked to join the teaching staff in 1996 and has been teaching drawing, painting and art history since.
Ms. Owens has exhibited her work extensively including The Museum of Science and Industry’s annual juried Black Creativity exhibition where she won many prizes including Best of Show, Woman Made Gallery in Chicago where she won First Place in the 5th International Art Open from juror, internationally acclaimed artist, Faith Ringgold competing with 500 artists to win a solo exhibition. Owens also won First Prize in the 9th International Open at Woman Made Gallery in 2006, juried by the Chicago Sun-Times art critic and Artnews correspondent Margaret Hawkins, out of nearly 1200 international entries. Owens won “Best of Show” at ARC Gallery in February 2006, juried by John Pittman Weber. Both awards are solo exhibitions. Ms. Owens has exhibited at both Nicole Galleries, in River North and Bronzeville, Wood Street Gallery and Sculpture Garden was another venue for a solo exhibition as well as Elmhurst College, all in Chicago and Illinois. Owens exhibited at Connecticut College, The University of Pennsylvania Museum and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. She has exhibited work at the Butridge Gallery in Austin, Texas and at the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts in a national juried exhibition. She was selected to exhibit at The Homewood Studios in Minneapolis, Minnesota in a two-person show with ceramic artist, Marva Pitchford Jolly.
Owens has been the curator for a number of exhibitions; one recent show, Sapphire and Crystals: Black, White and Blues was selected by the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs, out of hundreds submitted, as one of 12 featured programs for October’s Chicago Artists Month. She curated three different back-to-back shows from for the Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago in their Michigan Avenue gallery in the church’s loggia to rave reviews.
Owens was selected to be the 2005 signature artist for Columbia College’s DanceAfrica Chicago’s 15th annual festival following in the footsteps of Kerry James Marshall who was selected year before last. In September 2005 Owens was the featured artist for Real Art Work (R.A.W.) held at the Parkway Ballroom Chicago and also interviewed Paul R. Jones, the Atlanta collector who has the largest collection of African American work in the country. Owens’ work was featured on ABC7 and public television (Ch. 11 and Ch. 20) many times this year as well as the Chicago Tribune. Writer Pamela Sherrod wrote in praise of Ms. Owens’ work in an article on the extensive Daniel T. Parker collection.
She was interviewed for Public Television’s Art Beat program (Channel 11, WTTW) regarding her duties as juror for the Museum of Science and Industry’s Black Creativity exhibition and in another interview about her participation in the 8th Inernational Art Open, a juried exhibition at Woman Made Gallery. Nathaniel McLin, the host of Critic’s Corner, a city college radio show, has interviewed Ms. Owens for his show as well. She was also interviewed by the Pioneer Press in Oak Park about one of the three exhibitions she curated for the Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago in 2005.
The many publications that have shown or written about her work include 250 Years of Afro American Art by Igoe and Igoe, The Chicago Sun-Times and The Chicago Tribune, Chicago Magazine and The New Art Examiner, N’Digo newspaper, The Chicago Defender newspaper, Savoy Magazine, The Chicago Reader and others. WGCI radio selected her painting, Writers on the Roof as the cover image for the 1997 calendar that was distributed by five radio stations nationally. Her work has been used as cover art for a textbook published by a Chicago Tribune company. In 2005, Ms. Owens works were shown in the photographic illustration for an article on Daniel T. Parker’s book on the artists in his collection. Joyce Owens’ Survivor Spirit painting was selected as a work of interest by the writer, Pamela Sherrod. Owens has been interviewed about her own work and duties as a curator and juror on public radio and television. Her work was shown on WBBM TV (CBS2), ABC7 Chicago, PBS 11 and on television stations in Philadelphia. Owens’ work was featured on the Metromix show on CLTV, the Chicago Tribune station, hosted by Lee Ann Trotter during her solo exhibition at Woman Made Gallery in 2003. In 2004 Owens was also interviewed at the South Side Community Art Center about the gallery and its place in the “new” Bronzeville. Her work was also shown in the public television documentary “Curators of Culture” featuring such art luminaries as Elizabeth Catlett, Charles White and Gordon Parks.
Joyce Owens participated in the Suite Home Chicago public art project during the summer of 2001. The sofa she and the Windy City Arts group painted was displayed in front of the Art Institute of Chicago. She was a featured artist in Chicago Artists Month sponsored by the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and photographed by Marc Hauser for all the city’s publicity materials. During this event Ms. Owens was the curator for the exhibition of Sapphire and Crystals collective at A.R.C. Gallery in Chicago a featured program selected by the department of Cultural Affairs.
In 2002 when the city selected her to participate on the prestigious advisory board for Chicago Artists Month she developed the theme that was used “Artists at Work“. This theme has continued to be a vital part of city programs to address artists’ issues. Ms. Owens was tapped by the city to contribute an article for CAR, the Chicago Artists resource chicagoartistsreource.
Joyce Owens has worked with the Illinois Arts Alliance and Illinois Arts Council to produce a workshop and is a member of the Art Institute and the Chicago Artists Coalition. Ms. Owens has been asked to jury exhibitions including head juror for the Museum of Science and Industry’s Black Creativity, Woman Made Gallery, the New East Side Art Fair, the Seaway Bank Art Fair and the DuSable Museum annual art fair.
In March 2006, Owens shared the podium with Chicago based artist Bernard Williams at Intuit Gallery in a discussion about each artists work. Joyce Owens was later asked to moderate a panel during Chicago Artists Month 2006 at Intuit Gallery entitled “Boundaries of Identity: An Artists: Dialogue” featuring a diverse group of Chicago-based artists. Owens participated in a scholarly panel at Columbia College discussing European Influences on African American Art. Owens has participated on and led panels at the South Side Community Art Center, The Open Door Gallery, Woman Made Gallery, Nicole Gallery and more.
Selected exhibitions and honors:
2007: Nicole Gallery, A Creative Alliance: Artists Who Teach, 4-person exhibition; Sept. 7 - Nov 3.
2007: Memories: Real and Imagined, Joyce Owens Paintings and Mixed Media, solo exhibition; Jan. 8 - Feb. 3
2007: Joyce Owens: Black, White and Colored, (forms in fact and fiction), solo exhibition; March 2 - March 29
2007: Joyce Owens, solo exhibition, Nicole Gallery, Chicago March 16 -April 28
2006: The Art Center in Higland Park, curator, exhibiting artist, Hot Images for Cold Times, group exhibition inlcluding Preston Jackson, Marva Jolly, Mary O'Shaughnessy, Anna M. Tyler, Al Tyler, Charlie van Gilder, Rhonda Wheatley, Julian Williams and Jill Zylke. Nov. 10- Dec. 5
2006: University Gallery, Chicago State University, Diasporal Rhythms Collector’s Invitational, 2006, Oct. 19-21
2006: Mars Gallery, Chicago: Wild Things and Beyond: Animal Images by Chicago Artists, juried group exhibition, October 12- Nov. 2
2006: ARC Gallery, Chicago: Black Faces: Rainbow Feelings, solo exhibition, prize for being award of Best of Show in a previous exhibition by John Pittman Weber, Oct. 4 -28
2006: Acme Arts Building, Peace and Justice: Artists for Change, Invitational group exhibition Sept. 29 – Oct. 14
2006: Pittsburg Center for the Arts; Migrations of the African Diaspora, juried exhibition, May 5- Aug 20
2006: Butridge Gallery, DAC, Austin, Texas; Boundless: Perceptions from Within, group exhibition, Mar 3-30
2006: Woman Made Gallery, Chicago; 9th International Open, Won First Prize, Margaret Hawkins, art critic, juror, Mar
2006: Arc Gallery, Chicago; I Have a Dream, juried exhibition, John Pittman Weber, juror, won Best of Show, Feb- Mar
2006: Neleh Gallery, Mentoring in the Community, presenting student artist, Feb - Mar
2006: Museum of Science and Industry, Black Creativity juried art exhibition, Chicago, Il, Jan-Feb.
2006: Artjaz Gallery, group show, invitational, Philadelphia, Pa., Jan- Mar
2005: Columbia College’s DanceAfrica Chicago’s 15th Anniversary, Chicago Theatre, signature poster artist. Sankofa was presented citywide in print form, on public transportation, on the , in the press, etc. (Oct)
2005: Sapphire and Crystals: Black White and Blues, Woman Made Gallery, curator. Exhibition selected as featured program for Chicago Artists Month, (Oct. 7 – Nov. 10)
2005: Real Art Works (R.A.W.) Vision at Parkway Ballroom. Featured artist. Image used on press and postcards, etc. and interviewed Paul R. Jones, (Sept. 30, Oct. 1, 2)
2005: Juried exhibition, Kymberly Pinder, PhD, juror, Women of the African Diaspora, Woman Made Gallery, Oct. 7 –Nov 10)
2005: Featured artist, Gallery Guichard, “X” anniversary exhibition of artists in the Daniel T. Parker collection, (Oct 1- Nov 12)
2005, Juried exhibition Two-person exhibition, Homewood Studios Gallery, Minneapolis, Minnesota, Trip Tick, (May 29 - June 30)
2005, Howard University Fine Art Gallery, juried exhibition, Eight Decades of Art at Howard University (March - Nov)
2005, Nicole Gallery, Chicago, group exhibition “Consciousness and Conditions IV” (Mar – April)
2005, The Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago, curator and exhibition artist, The Dream Revisited II: The Dream and the World (February)
2005, The Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago, curator and exhibition artist, Hot Images for Cold Times (January)
2004, Woman Made Gallery, Chicago, Holiday exhibition (November -December)
2004, Wood Street Gallery and Sculpture Garden, Holiday Exhibition “Out There Art Fair” (November)
2004, South Shore Cultural Center’s Fine Art Gallery, launch for Chicago Artists Month, African Art: The Diaspora and Beyond (September - October)
2004, Nicole Gallery (River North), three person exhibition Art Connects: Shared Visions, Distinct Views (October)
2004, Guest speaker, Artists at Work Forum, Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs
(October 14)
2004, The Fourth Presbyterian Church of Chicago, A Dream Revisited exhibition, curator and exhibiting artist January 4 to February 22)
2003, ETA Creative Arts Foundation and South Shore Cultural Center, Chicago, The Art of Culture exhibition (August 9 until September 3)
2003, South Shore Cultural center, Chicago, Curator and participating artist, Sapphire and Crystals: From Within, invitational (September)
2003, Supreme Gallery, Chicago, group exhibition
2003, Womanmade Gallery, Chicago, solo exhibition Layers, Levels and Lives, First place winner in the 5th International Art Open, Faith Ringgold, juror ((September 5-October 12)
2003, Womanmade Gallery, Chicago, Holiday show (November 28- December 21)
2003, Wood Street Gallery and Sculpture Garden, Holiday Exhibition Out There Art Fair (November)
2003, Chicago Cultural Center, Flights of the Imagination, kite show (April 19- June 15)
2003, Sidley, Austin and Brown law offices, speaking engagement
2003, Chicago Artists Coalition, Gallery of the School of the Art Institute, Chicago Art Open
2003, Artist salons, Nicole Gallery: “How Teaching Informs my art”. Formulated the title of the month-long event and secured some speakers.
2003 Speaker, Chicago regional Office of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (February 10)
2003, Philadelphia Convention Center, Art Expo, represented by Nicole Gallery, Chicago
2003, Nicole Gallery 2
2003, Illinois Arts Council, conducted workshop
2003, Chicago artists Month Advisory Board
2002 South Shore Cultural Center Women’s Heritage Month, Sapphire and Crystals and the Savannah Six (March 9-April 5)
2002, Womanmade Gallery, 5th International Art Open, first place winner, juror Faith Ringgold (March1- March 28)
2002, Museum of Science and Industry, Chicago, Black Creativity 2002, juried exhibition (January- February 28)
2002, Wood Street Gallery and Sculpture Garden, Chicago, Wish You Were Here, co-curator, exhibiting artist
2002, Wood Street Gallery and Sculpture Garden, Chicago, Bird, Baths and Beyond, (May 4- June 14)
2002, Nicole Gallery, Chicago, Consciousness and Conditions (March 9 - April 27)
2001, Wood Street Gallery and Sculpture Garden, Chicago Small Packages IV (November - December)
2001, Artemisia Gallery, Chicago, Chicago Artists Month, Mentors, Goddesses, and Other Heroes, curator, program producer, featured program, Chicago Artists Month
2001, Union Street Gallery, Chicago Heights, Il, Reconnections
2000, Wood Street Gallery and Sculpture Garden, one-person exhibition (March)
2000, Museum of Science and Industry, Black Creativity juried exhibition (January- March)
1999, The Museum of Science and Industry juried exhibition, Black Creativity, Chicago, IL., (January –March)
1998, Wood Street Gallery, Small Packages exhibition, group show, Chicago, IL., (December)
1998, Celebrity Chair Auction artist (November)
1998, South Side Community Art Center, Threesome, Chicago, Il., (October)
1998, Chicago State University, Faculty Exhibition, Chicago, Il., (November)
1998, National Association of Black Journalists Convention, Cheryl Sutton, and Associates, Washington, D.C. (July)
1998, Brushstrokes, Exhibition, Southwest Women Working Together, (June)
1998, Jonnu Gallery, Sag Harbor, New York, (June - December)
1998, South Shore Cultural Center, 100 Hands Exhibition, (February )
1997, The Martin Luther King Center, Columbus, Ohio, group exhibit
1997, Keita Gallery and Salon group exhibition (September-October)
1997, Northern Indiana Arts Association "African American Artists in Chicago
and the Calumet Region
1997, WGCI, selected cover artist for calendar
1996 and 1995 -Wood Street Gallery, Chicago, invitational Christmas exhibit
1997, 1996,1995,1994- Wood Street Gallery, invitational kite exhibition (selected artists)
1996- Wood Street Gallery, invitational, Pandora’s Box exhibition (selected artists)
1996, Museum of Science and Industry, Black Creativity juried exhibit (award)
1996, South Side Community Art Center, Art Auction (yearly)
1996- South Side Community Art Center, invitational exhibition for Women's month
1995-Satori Fineart, Ornaments and Angels Christmas exhibit
1995, Museum of Science and Industry, Black Creativity, (award)
from 1986 to 1995 included in many juried exhibitions with
jurors such as Madeline Rabb, (won Best of Show) Martin Puryear, (won Honorable
Mention) .
1995, 1994, l993, l992, Sapphire and Crystal Exhibitions at Satori Fineart, Bagit,
Wood Street Gallery and Artemisia Galleries respectively.
1994, Chicago State University, one-woman exhibition, President’s Gallery, Chicago, Il
1992, South Side Community Art Center, Portraits, invitational group exhibition, Chicago, Il
1992, South Side Community Art Center, The Next Generation, invitational group
exhibition, Chicago, Il
1991, South Side Community Art Center, The Anniversary Invitational, group
exhibition , Chicago, Il
1991, South Side Community Art Center, Miniature Art, invitational exhibition, Chicago, Il
1990, Spertus Museum, Perception of the Other, juried exhibition,
sponsored by the Women's Caucus for Art, Chicago, Il
1983, Lamont Zeno Theater Gallery, one person exhibition, Chicago, Il
1983, National Conference of Artists 25th Invitational Exhibit, Drawing, The Realist
Perspective, Chicago, Il
1983, Chicago State University, invitational group exhibition, Chicago, Il
1982, Sheffield Gallery, two-person exhibition, Chicago, Il
1982, Clarence White Gallery, Chicago, one-person exhibition, Chicago, Il
1982, Elmhurst College, one-person exhibition, Illinois
Ms Owens is in many collections.
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