Jay Willis received a BFA in Sculpture from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 1964 and an MA, also in Sculpture, from the University of California, Berkeley in 1966. He has had one-person exhibitons at Double Vision Gallery, Cirrus Gallery, both in Los Angeles, and Limn Gallery in San Francisco. Willis has particpated in numerous group exhibitions, including Flourish at the Torrance Museum of Art, 2003 Armory Outdoor Sculpture Installation at the Armory Center for the Arts, Blessing and Beginnings at the Skirball Cultural Center, and Olympic Project at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the Smithsonian Institution, Walker Hill Art Museum in Seoul, and the Laguna Beach Museum of Art all have works by Willis in their public collections.