Joy during the filming of “The Horse Latitudes” music video for the Beauty Marks’ newest album “Out of My Dreams and Into My Arms” (released Dec 2011). (Photo by Xun Chi.)

Joy Shannon is a the recording, performing and visual artist and author front-woman of the dark Celtic folk-rock band “Joy Shannon and the Beauty Marks”. Joy plays Celtic harp, cello, accordion and harmonium and sings. She has a bachelors degree in Visual Arts and Theatre Arts (with a focus in printmaking and theatrical makeup and wig design) and a masters degree in American Studies with a focus in cultural art history and the history of countercultures, both from Cal State Fullerton. Combining her focus on the arts and countercultures, Joy’s first full-length book The First Counterculture Celebrity: Oscar Wilde’s 1882 North American Tour (Plain and Simple Books, 2011) showed how Wilde’s tour influenced trends in art, fashion and music in 1882. Music: www.joyshannonandthebeautymarks.com