Jo Dery is an artist who experiments with visual storytelling. She makes animation, books and comics, works on paper, and multi-media projects. Her creative practice is rooted in drawing and writing. Her stories are inspired by folklore, memoir, and a deep love of the natural world.
Her short films have screened at the Ann Arbor Film Festival, the International Film Festival Rotterdam, and the Eyeworks Festival of Experimental Animation. In 2012, she received the Helen Hill Award, which supports innovative independent filmmakers, and in 2013 she was included in Chronicle Books' Animation Sketchbooks. She has been awarded grants from the LEF Foundation, The Free History Project, and the Rhode Island State Council on the Arts. Her drawings, prints, and multi-media projects have been exhibited in Providence, Boston, New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Berlin. Her books can be found in independent stores like Ada Books (Providence), Quimby's (Chicago), and Little Otsu (Portland), and her comics have been listed as "Notable Comics" in Best American Comics series three times.
She earned a B.F.A. in film/animation/video from the Rhode Island School of Design and an M.F.A. in interdisciplinary arts from Goddard College. She has completed residencies at MacDowell and the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, as well as participated in an animation workshop at the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow, Poland.
Jo has a decade of higher education teaching experience, with a specialty in Animation and Digital Media. She is currently an associate professor of film studies at Keene State College in southern New Hampshire.
