Joy Reed Belt

SECRETARY

Joy Reed Belt refers to her current role as the owner of JRB Art at The Elms as her “third act.” Belt’s career began as a high school speech, drama, and English teacher. While earning her master’s and doctoral degrees, she taught humanities at a college level.
Belt left academia in the early 1980s to become a licensed professional counselor and a human resources consultant, specializing in executive search, outplacement, and executive coaching.
In 1999 while her late-husband, attorney John Belt, was developing the Paseo Arts District, he gifted her a series of painting lessons with the hope that they would make her relax. She opened a small art gallery on Paseo Drive in 2000. By 2001 Belt moved the gallery to its current location at The Elms, an 8,000 sq. ft. Spanish Revival structure built in 1920 by artist, Nan Sheets.
Belt has been recognized for her expertise and interest in a variety of disciplines and issues. She has served on the boards of many organizations such as: the Oklahoma City Chamber of Commerce, the Homeless Alliance, United Way, Oklahomans for the Arts, Leadership Oklahoma City, Harding Fine Arts Charter Academy, the Paseo Arts Association, the Board of Visitors for the University of Oklahoma Colleges of Fine Art, the College of Communications at the University of Florida, and as a member of the inaugural class of Leadership Oklahoma City. She has received several lifetime achievement awards including the Governor’s Award for Business and the Arts.
Belt is an avid writer, who’s column, Career Strategies, was nationally syndicated. Currently she pens a weekly blog, Living With Art, and collects information for use in a series of novels she plans to write about Oklahoma City. Belt lives in Oklahoma City with her beloved Yorkie, a drop-eared rescue named JoyJoy.