Joy Feasley combines painting and installation creating environments steeped in alternative belief systems (the occult, the Shaker religion, the dreamworld) that reinterpret ideas of the sublime, depicting nature as both ominous and life-affirming. Moving between abstraction and representation often in the same work, Feasley’s paintings incorporate sacred geometries as well as personal narratives. She often works collaboratively with her husband, Paul Swenbeck. Most recently (2018), Feasley and Swenbeck created a large scale environment for the John Michael Kohler Arts Center, Sheboygan, WI.
She has shown at venues including the Fabric Workshop and Museum, Moore College of Art, the Temple Gallery, the Institute of Contemporary Art at the University of Pennsylvania, Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, and Vox Populi, all in Philadelphia, PA; Adams and Ollman, Portland, OR; Columbia College, Chicago, IL; LUMP Gallery and Contemporary Art Museum, Raleigh, NC. Her work is in the collections of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the West Collection. She has been in residence at the Acadia Summer Arts Program, Bar Harbor, ME and at the 18th Street Arts Center Santa Monica, CA. In 2011 she was awarded a Pew Fellowship in the Arts.
Joy Feasley and Paul Swenbeck will present a collaborative installation, Midnight Sun, sponsored by Adams and Ollman and Fleisher/Ollman
(group)
Colonels Row, Governors Island
New York, NY
May 4 2019–Aug 4 2019
Bea Huff Hunter reviews Out, Out, Phosphene Candle at the John MIchael Kohler Arts Center
Adams and Ollman, Portland; and Chapter NY present a three-person exhibition including Joy Feasley.
Chapter NY
New York, NY
Jun 29–Jul 27, 2018
Video interview with Paul Swenbeck and Joy Feasley at Kohler Arts Center
Out, Out Phosphene Candle
John Michael Kohler Art Center
Sheboygan, Wisconsin
Feb 25–Sep 02, 2018
Photo: Kohler Co., John Michael Kohler Arts Center
Adams and Ollman
Portland, OR
Oct 20–Nov 22, 2017
Adams and Ollman
Portland, OR
Jul 15–Aug 13, 2016
Including: Charles Burchfield, Joy Feasley, Johanna Jackson, Chris Johanson, Paul Swenbeck, Agatha Wojciechowsky
Feasley and Swenbeck's collaborative installation A Hatchet to Kill Old Ugly at the Fabric Workshop and Museum's New Temporary Contemporary, is an Artforum Critics' Pick.
This collaborative installation of paintings, ceramics, furniture, sculpture and interior decor by Paul Swenbeck and Joy Feasley is inspired by Shaker spirit drawings and magic. The exhibition derives its title from a Shaker name for the Devil—“Old Ugly”—seen in spirit drawings, which the Shakers created to describe symbols seen in visions.
Fabric Workshop and Museum
The New Temporary Contemporary
1222 Arch Street
Philadelphia, PA 19107-2816
October 2, 2014–January 4, 2015