Joan is a former chairperson of the ICP documnetary program and was director of the library of Magnum Photos. She is a photo editor as well as a photographer and is the author of two books, Drive-Ins, and Marseille, which was published by Damiani in 2016. She was the editor of Mary Ellen Mark's Falkland Road and Charles Harbutt's Departures and Arrivals, among many others. In 2017, her archive was acquired by the Center of Creative Photography in Tucson.