I was sorry to hear that Jeffrey Catherine Jones died yesterday at the age of 67.
Jones, As I reported in my brief 2006 post, was an influential fantasy artist and illustrator who also did comics and gallery art.
Part of The Studio, a renowned group of illustrators and comics artists in the 1970’s that included Barry Windsor-Smith, Berni Wrightson and Michael William Kaluta, Jones had been called “the greatest living painter” by Frank Frazetta.
Jones helped introduce classical art themes into comics, but was primarily known for her atmospheric, painterly and wonderfully textural paintings for fantasy book covers.
There are a couple of collections of Jones’ work that appear to be out of print, but can be found used: The Art of Jeffrey Jones, Jeffrey Jones: A Life in Art and Age of Innocence: The Romantic Art of Jeffrey Jones. There is also a Jeffrey Jones Sketchbook, which is more readily available.
Maria Cabardo has been working on a film about Jones’ life and art titled Better Things: The Life and Choices of Jeffrey Catherine Jones. Her studio, MaCab films, initiated a Kickstarter project to fund the film but it fell short. I believe they are still soliciting donations directly, though I don’t know the current status of the project. There is another clip here.
There is a nice tribute to Jones on the Muddy Colors blog.
Thanks for introducing this fascinating woman artist to me, Charley.
May she rest in peace.
This is the link to JC Jones’s autobiography, that was not easy to retrieve:
http://www.jeffreyjones-art.com/autobiography.html
With regards,
Ael
I still remember the first time I saw Jones work… an original for sure and one of my favorites. For me, favorites means I never tire of looking at it. Jones is in that category. I have three of the above books on him, time to seek out the others.
An exclusive, but not so recent interview by Laurie J. Anderson is here:
http://www.sequentialtart.com/archive/july04/jcjones.shtml
The photograph on the page hints at Jones’s (or Jones’) privately chosen, identifiable gender.
Wonderful work, but I am confused ! Your short piece mentions ‘ her’,but the group photo of ‘ The Studio ‘ shows Jones as a man, or a bearded lady !!
Whatever, great work, and another huge talent that will be missed.
Ah, just read the bio ! Now I understand – enough said !
R.I.P. Jeffrey
Charley – I had no idea, so thanks for posting this. I’ve loved Jones’ work from the moment I first saw it about 5 years ago. I spent a few days scouring the net for everything I could find – both in her drawings & illustrations – and her life. I do hope the film is made, or at the very least – a retrospective of her work is mounted somewhere. I would bet that anyone with an affinity for sensitive, ethereal and painterly art would enjoy seeing her work in person. RIP, Catherine.
Loved this guys work. I do wonder about this statement from Frazetta. ” jeffrey Jones is the greatest living painter”. I find it odd that Frank would say that about any contemporary artist.