Hello, Hello!
I’m Chloe Joy.
You’ve either stumbled upon or been recommended my page, and I thank you for caring to know a bit more about my story and heart behind Fin-Kin.
Here's the short of it:
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Fin-Kin (Fin-Kinship) is defined as art created with the end goal of finding, what I believe to be, the true possible relationship, kinship, that can exist between all people and all things. In everything I say, do, and make, I strive to get closer to the truth of that knowing of something that would be so intimate as to be called a blood relationship.
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This is storytelling driven by Joy, Curiosity, Creativity, and Authenticity.
From Under a Rock
Telling a story always begun with a question.
But I didn't start out asking through films. It was the pencil and an empty scrap of paper at a restaurant, a vacant piano in the back of the church after service, late nights and early mornings adding words to one of my dozens of unfinished manuscripts. In time, these scattered hobbies coalesced into one medium: films.
But always, these things were in pursuit of answering questions that boiled up about everything I did—what does it mean?
What does it point back to? Or who?
At the heart of these questions lies my faith. I believe in a Love that exists within and beyond all things, a Creator who crafted the world with meticulous intention, and overflowing with individual identity. That conviction shapes my work, and has led to a belief I live by: nothing is separate, everything is in relationship.
But it's my choice how healthily that relationship functions. To know and be known begins with the truth of identity.
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To truly know something’s identity, we must ask what it is. First, what it’s made by—for me, that answer is God. He immediately defines worth and purpose. Second, where it’s been and what it has seen in its time here—that's your story, the lived experiences that shape you. And third, what that story might look like when captured from another’s perspective.
Every person is a lens. Every person has a vision.
When you invite me to create with you, you are asking for mine: one that believes we are made to be deeply known and understood, one that sees a story worth telling within every human being and every quiet corner of the earth, and one that seeks to tell it in a way that makes others curious, bringing out the joy of life with every word, every picture, every frame.
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Fin-Kin came from a conversation with a friend. I was stumped for months, trying to find a word or phrase that captured the essence of my studio. One morning, she was at work making lattes behind the counter, and I was at her bar still hacking away at my studio name. Between comments on the differences in our barista employments and catching up on life, a question came up about the name of her coffee shop. Breaking it down, we discussed the use of the suffix “-ship” as a vessel to carry, and then kin—like family, like connection. The word lit up. Kinship.
I read definition to her: “A state of being connected or related, by family ties, shared interests, or common qualities — a blood relationship.” It clicked.
Later that day, in a notebook overflowing with possible words, fin kept repeating. Fin. The French word for end. The title that played on the final seconds of a film. Fin. The goal when all is said and done. When we are finished, what is left? What was this for? What was my art, my life, for?
Something as thick as blood, binding all things, — my end goal was to to express this in every form I could. To live out this truth of connection in my person, and in my art.
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That is why relationship is at the center of my work. Nothing exists in isolation. Relationship is a give and take. I want to go about the world with curiosity and empathy, to understand the perspective of another so well that when I relay it, a truth about that person is undeniably revealed—and perhaps even shown in a way someone might call beautiful.
Fin-Kin is not just a studio to me, but a way of living with intention.
There is no way for me to capture something and relay it without in some way telling my story, too. Every piece of art has its maker’s fingerprints hidden in the strokes. As that’s true of us, I believe that’s true of the Father.
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I’m not looking to make something perfect. I don’t believe in perfection, and the search for perfection is empty in humanity anyway. I’m looking to make something beautiful. I’m looking to represent something real. And if that pursuit of joy, curiosity, creativity, and authenticity makes your heart come alive, too, then I’d love to create something beautiful with you.​