Joy Fire

As a Studio Art major, I grav­i­tated toward three dimen­sional work, and espe­cially enjoyed stone carving, jewelry, and bronze casting classes. The year I was grad­u­at­ing I stum­bled upon a local archi­tec­tural orna­men­tal iron­work shop and imme­di­ately real­ized this was the medium I had been looking for, without knowing it even existed. For four years I worked at this shop, where I learned welding and forging and became the head blacksmith’s assis­tant. Concur­rently, I began design­ing and fabri­cat­ing my own pieces, focus­ing on wood and metal furni­ture and other func­tional objects. In 2014 I moved to Orange County and, began renting a shop space in 2016. I estab­lished Joy Fire Black­smith, a sole propri­etor­ship, where I fabri­cate custom metal­work and continue to develop my own designs. In 2020, I entered an MFA program at Clare­mont Grad­u­ate Univer­sity and grad­u­ated in 2022. I am extremely inter­ested in story, imag­i­na­tion, and the phys­i­cal expe­ri­ence of reality through the senses. I develop my furni­ture designs through an obses­sive inves­ti­ga­tion of an aesthetic. Each object is an offer­ing to the viewer, a reminder of your exis­tence through the sensa­tion of space, form, and mate­ri­als. I am a certi­fied instruc­tor with the Cali­for­nia Black­smith Asso­ci­a­tion, teach black­smithing and bronze casting and am a Welding Instruc­tor at Orange Coast College. I have also published writing in the maga­zine Cali­for­nia Black­smith and am a gover­nance commit­tee member for the Society of Inclu­sive Black­smiths. We promote and support oppor­tu­ni­ties to pursue black­smithing for women, LGBTQ+, BIPOC, AAPI and MENA folks, those with disabil­i­ties, and others who have histor­i­cally been margin­al­ized in this field.