​Biography

Joanna Priestley has directed, animated, and produced 36 award winning films and the iOS app Clam Bake. Her animated feature, North of Blue, won Best Experimental Film at the Indie Film Awards in Amsterdam and Best Feature Film at the Los Angeles Animation Festival. Her work maintains a high level of porosity between intuitive experimentation and exploration of technical and creative boundaries. Retrospectives of Priestley's films have been shown at the British Film Institute (London), Museum of Modern Art (New York), Center for Contemporary Art (Warsaw, Poland), REDCAT (Los Angeles), American Cinematheque (Los Angeles), Stuttgart International Animation Festival (Germany), Walker Art Center (Minneapolis, MN), Jeonju International Film Festival (Korea), Masters of Animation (Trivandrum, India) and on PBS (USA) and the BBC (UK). She has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, American Film Institute, MacDowell Colony (Elodie Osborn Fellow), Creative Capital (New York), Djerassi Foundation (Rothenberg Award) and Fundación Valparaíso (Spain). Her films are in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art (New York, NY), Academy Film Archive (Los Angeles, CA) and Harvard University Film Archive (Boston, MA).

 

Priestley studied painting and printmaking at Rhode Island School of Design and at UC Berkeley, where she received a Bachelor of Arts Degree with Honors. She received an MFA Degree and the Louis B. Mayer Award from California Institute of the Arts. Her background includes Coordinator of the Northwest Film and Video Festival, Director of Strictly Cinema, Editor of "The Animator", Regional Coordinator of the Northwest Film Center and Co-Director and Co-Founder of FILMA: Women's Film Forum. Priestley was founding president of ASIFA Northwest and she is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and she has served on the  Animation Branch Executive Committee. 

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Priestley has served on numerous juries and selection committees, including Annecy International Animation Festival, Fantoche International Animation Festival, Annie Awards, Stuttgart International Animation Festival, Nicholl Screenplay Fellowship, International Animation Festival Chilemonos, Canadian International Animation Festival and the Public Art Advisory Committee for the City of Portland, OR. She also annually juries the Oscars and Student Academy Awards. She presents films and animation workshops worldwide and offers an internship program at Priestley Motion Pictures, in Portland, Oregon. Priestley's other passions include medicinal herbalism and hiking in the woods with her husband, director/production designer Paul Harrod. Her films can be seen at www.joannapriestley.com.

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Retrospectives

2024. PFCAT Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (Portland, OR, USA)

2023. Universidad Iberoamericana (Puebla, Mexico)

2023. Music Box Theater, UMBC (Baltimore, MD, USA)

2019. Sweaty Eyeballs Animation Festival (Baltimore, MD, USA)

2019. Fantoche International Animation Festival (Baden, Switzerland)

2017. Trailblazing Women of Animation: Joanna Priestley, NW Film Center/

          Portland Art Museum (Portland, OR, USA)

2017. British Film Institute, National Film Theater (London, UK)

2017. Stuttgart International Animation Festival (Stuttgart, Germany)

2016. Tricky Women Animation Festival (Vienna, Austria)

2015. Art Education Conference, Kutztown University (Kutztown, PA, USA) 

2015. Cinema Pacific Festival, Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art (Eugene, OR, USA)

2014. Hiroshima Animation Festival (Hiroshima, Japan)

2014. POW Fest (Portland, OR, USA) Received POW Fest Pioneer Award

2013. Sisters Movie House (Sisters, OR, USA)

2013. Northwest Film Center/Portland Art Museum (Portland, OR, USA)

2011. Vashon Arts and Lectures (Vashon Island, WA, USA)

2010. Cinemateca Santa Ana (San Miguel de Allende, Mexico) 

2009. REDCAT (Los Angeles, CA, USA)

2009. Cinemateca Santa Ana (San Miguel de Allende, Mexico)

2005. American Cinematheque (Los Angeles, CA, USA)

2005. Jeonju International Film Festival (Jeonju, Korea)

2005. Walker Art Center (Minneapolis, MN, USA)

2003. Northwest Film Center/Portland Art Museum (Portland, OR, USA)

2000. Museum of Modern Art (New York, NY, USA)

2000. Masters of Animation (Trivandrum, India)

2000. Pacific Film Archive (Berkeley, CA, USA)

1998. Vassar College ( (Poughkeepsie, NY, USA)

1996. Animated Women: the Art of Joanna Priestley (PBS and BBC2)

1995. Animerter Dager (Oslo, Norway)

1994. Stuttgart International Animation Festival (Stuttgart, Germany)

1991. Florida International Film Festival (Jacksonville, FL, USA)

1990. Krakow International Short Film Festival (Krakow, Poland)

1990. Center for Contemporary Art (Warsaw, Poland)

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