Joe Diggs

Joseph (Joe) Diggs is a practicing artist, curator, and educator who lives and works in Cape Cod. His paintings range from realist depictions of African American history and personal family memories to gestural plein-air landscapes and geometric abstractions, and they span in scale from large, wall-sized murals to small, intimate works on cardboard.  Diggs’ expansive artistic vision is unified by dynamic textures, perspectives, colors, and forms. Although anchored in his local Cape Cod community, Joe Diggs’ paintings are in many national and international private collections.

Joe Diggs was born in Croix Chapeau, France, to a military family with roots in the historic African American community around Cape Cod.  After graduating from Southeastern Massachusetts University with a bachelor’s degree in fine art painting, Diggs traveled the world as a flight attendant, incorporating global sights, sounds, colors, and cultures into his art practice. In 2015, Joe completed his Master of Fine Arts at Massachusetts College of Art and Design and maintains his studio at his family’s compound in Osterville, MA.

As an art educator, Joe Diggs teaches at the Cotuit Center for the Arts in Cotuit, MA, Castle Hill Arts Center in Wellfleet, MA, and the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, MA. Since 2015, Joe has taught Foundations in Art and Expression to incarcerated youth at the Department of Youth Services in Brewster, MA. 

Joe Diggs’s work as a curator includes exhibitions for the Cotuit Center for the Arts and the Zion Union Museum in Hyannis, MA. He has also participated in numerous solo exhibitions and anticipates the upcoming Joe Diggs | Evolving Circles at the Provincetown Artists Association and Museum in July 2025. Joe Diggs is represented by the Berta Walker Gallery in Provincetown, MA.