2020 - 2023

Continues to exhibit in Omaha and joins the Minima Gallery in Mykonos Greece. In 2023 visits the island of Gan on Addu Atoll, the southernmost group of islands in the Maldives, where Steve was based in the Royal Air Force in 1972-73. The visit is of great importance.  

Starts working in a studio in Orient, Long Island, New York. From 2020 spends the winters working in Berlin and in Orient during the Spring and Summer.

Has a museum survey at the Sioux City Art Centre in Iowa. The exhibition 'Icons, Elizabethans and Elegies to a Mad King' includes work from the past ten years. 

Galerie Erich Storrer, Zurich, publishes Steve Joy, 2017, with additional illustrations.

Returns to England to spend an extended period of time working in his windswept studio overlooking the sea on the Rame Peninsula in an area near Plymouth referred to as 'The Forgotten Corner'. Begins the 'Elegies to a Mad King' series.

Continues to exhibit throughout United States and Europe including major museum surveys in Norway and one-person gallery exhibitions in England, Switzerland and Scandinavia.

Works between a studio on the Rame Peninsula Cornwall, England during the summers and in Omaha, Nebraska during winters.

Retrospective exhibition at the Joslyn Museum, Omaha, Nebraska, USA.

Uncreated Light Monograph published by Prestel, Munich, author David Carrier.  

Rents a cottage on the edge of Dartmoor, England. Begins the series entitled The Temple Of Athene.

Rents a studio in Norway — a cottage by the Fjord between Oslo and Bergen, alongside the Hole Art Centre at Naess summer and autumn.

Continues (from 2003) to be based in Omaha, but spends most summers back in his hometown in England, at the family home, on the edge of Dartmoor, Devon.

Begins to travel extensively in Mexico (Yucatán), India and Morocco. In Morocco travels over the Atlas Mountains to Erfoud at the edge of the Sahara.

Revisits the Indian Ocean islands of the Maldives and earlier places of inspiration and abode. Journeys to the southern Addu Atoll, site of the Royal Air Force base in 1971.

Continues to work in New York. Also spends time working in the Old Market district of Omaha.

Begins to work in New York again, after leaving the Bemis. Spends summers back in Umbria, Italy.

Becomes curator at the Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts in Omaha, Nebraska and moves more permanently to the United States later that year.

Accepts a professorship at the Bergen National Academy of Arts in Bergen, Norway. Commutes between Norway and Spain. First museum shows in Norway — in Haugesund and later Bergen.

Takes a new studio in Barcelona, close to the university and joins the Ferran Cano Gallery in Palma de Mallorca and Barcelona. Friendship with Sean Scully deepens — Scully lives across the hallway in Barcelona.

Becomes professor of painting at the École des Beaux-Arts de Caen in France and moves to a studio in the village of Thury-Harcourt (Suisse Normande). Has first museum show in France in the City Museum of Caen.

Moves to New York City and begins to work in a studio on Bond Street. Joins the Ruth Siegel Gallery on West 57th Street. Spends the summers in a new studio in Barcelona, close to the port in the Gothic Quarter.

Moves to the Balearic Island of Minorca, taking a studio in the capital (Mahón) at first, and then later in a disused convent in the middle of the island.

Spends winters in the medieval Belgian city of Bruges. Joins the ‘tleerhuys Galerij and works in a studio in a sixteenth-century coaching house close to the Groeningemuseum. This, and the proximity of Antwerp and Ghent, afford access to the great masters of Flemish painting. Divides time between Bruges (winters) and Umbria, Italy (summers) for the coming years.

Packs all belongings in an old car and drives to Italy. Finds a wonderful studio in Umbria. At first the studio is in a medieval castle not far from Assisi, Castello di Polgeto, and then later moves nearby to a studio attached to an eleventh-century church. Begins an extensive study of pre-Renaissance and Renaissance painting. Represents Norway at the Stockholm International Art Fair.

Moves to Norway, at first to a small cottage at Tysnes, a Viking burial ground. Later moves to Oslo, marries Elenor Martinsen and rents a studio in the center of Oslo. Becomes a professor at The Trondheim Academy of Fine Art

Moves to Kyoto, Japan to study calligraphy and Japanese culture at Kyoto University of Arts. Reads and is very influenced by the writings of Yukio Mishima

Takes some time to bicycle through Spain alone, after graduating and discovers the poetry of Pablo Neruda, Antonio Machado, and, especially, the work of the Peruvian poet César Vallejo, which will guide Joy throughout his life.

Takes a painting fellowship at Cheltenham College, England in the autumn. This provides the first real studio in a converted museum in the town of Stroud, in the Cotswolds. Works on a series of monolith, monochrome paintings, based on the Duino Elegies by Rainer Maria Rilke. These would be exhibited at the Serpentine Gallery in London and would be Joy’s first museum exhibition.

Begins a master’s program at Chelsea College of Arts in London, graduating in 1981 with an M.F.A. in painting. Meets, and is profoundly influenced by the painters Ian Stephenson and Bob Law. It is particularly Bob Law’s vision of painting which motivates Joy in the directions his work will take.

Has first important solo exhibition at the Riverside Studios in London. Bicycles from Holland to Norway with two fellow painters from Exeter College in the summer

Begins art education at Cardiff College of Art in Wales, moving to Exeter to complete a B.A. (Hons) program in fine arts. Begins by studying sculpture.

Visits the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, exposing Joy to the paintings and philosophy of Barnett Newman. It is here that the idea of becoming an abstract painter takes shape. Begins to study comparative religions at the Royal Air Force College for Chaplains, in Andover, England. Thinks of becoming an ordained minister at this point.

Joins the bicycle racing team for the Royal Air Force, and represents the service throughout Europe, as well as at the Commonwealth Games in New Zealand, entertaining the idea of becoming a professional.

Joins the Royal Air Force and travels extensively through the Far East, the Middle East and Mediterranean including two years on a small tropical coral island at the southernmost Atoll of the Maldives in the Indian Ocean. Discovers The Masterpiece, a book by Emil Zola about Paul Cezanne, which installs the notion of eventually becoming an artist and painter.

Moves with his family to a small village near the sea in Cornwall, called St Anthony and moved shortly thereafter to nearby St John

 Steve Joy is born on October 7 in the city of Plymouth, England to Dorothy Joan and Leonard Joy