Joy Bell grew up by the beach near Melbourne. The youngest in a large musical family. In her Junior HS year she left for California as an AFS scholarship student, it was to be her first solo adventure overseas. While studying Social work in college Joy met with Vivien’s modeling agency, who predicted a very different career path. Within 2 years of learning the business, she had left for Europe.
The joy of living like a local, learning the languages and customs while modeling with Italian Vogue, or Harper’s Bazaar ended up paying the tuition.
On arrival in NYC, she caught the eye of Eileen Ford and Grace Mirabella. The first American Vogue shoots were with Glaviano, Irving Penn, Iman and Vera Wang. Advertising followed with Hiro, Albert Watson and the fabulous Bobbi Brown, Way Bandy and Frederik Fekkai. Yet this move to the states was ultimately for the chance to see Miles, Nancy Wilson, Luther Vandross, Black Uhuru, Grandmaster Flash’s debut and even Ms Peggy Lee, live in concert.
In time Joy photographed Ms Abbey Lincoln, Wayne Shorter, Cassandra Wilson and Sean Lennon for Verve Records PR. Or Reggae Album covers for Polygram. This work took her to Cuba and around the Caribbean for music festivals but her greatest thrill was taking stills of her childhood idols, Ms Chaka Khan and Mr James Brown in the press pit at NYC’s Summer Stage. Her work was published in the New York Times, Jazz times, BET and Australian travel Magazines. This lead to press trips with journalists for the Italian, German, Spanish and New Zealand tourist boards. Joy also coproduced fashion stories as a presenter for Australian prime time television. While training FORD MODELS and IMG’s new faces with test shoots at Fadil Berisha’s studio.
At 30 Joy became Oil of Olay’s spokesperson following a steady stream of TV ads as a
business woman for Spiegel /Avis/United Airlines, a Cowgirl for beers, glamour girl for Vanity Fair or a Mommy for Pampers or Liz Claiborne perfume. A contract on NBC’s soap opera “ANOTHER WORLD” followed, with even more professional classes, culminating in attending the Yale School of Drama’s summer program at Oxford with Earl Gister and RADA luminaries as tutors.
Currently Joy continues her travel between her Brooklyn, LA, Costa Rican, Jamaican and Australian families, delighted to be back on the road modeling. She is still taking an abundance of photos and hoping to be a fairy godmother while encouraging younger talent wherever she can.
