Aletha grew up on a small Indiana farm where her first models were the often-uncooperative dairy cows. Introduced to art in childhood, she went on to earn a Master of Fine Arts degree from Bowling Green State University. Prior to moving to her current home in Madison, Wisconsin, she was a University Design and Drawing Instructor at the Toledo Museum of Art School of Design, Bowling Green State University (Bowling Green, Ohio), and Marietta College (Marietta, Ohio).
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"Italian Riddle at the Garden Window"
by Aletha Jones
of Madison, Wisconsin
Painting - watercolor / pastel
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Watercolor Paintings
Watercolor has been the dominant medium in her work for the past twenty years.
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Although I initially began my graduate studies as an oil painter, I started experimenting with watercolor shortly thereafter, and have continued these explorations into the present. I have chosen watercolor because I find a real joy in it. It has such simplicity: the interaction of pigment and water. I feel at home with it, yet am continually surprised by its diverse capacities.
I develop my paintings with transparent layers, a carry-over technique from my years as an oil painter.
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Watercolor Paintings
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I want my drawings to show the evidence of my personal involvement, the individual strokes of the artist's hand. I choose black and white materials because I am attracted to the strong highlights and powerful darks, reminiscent of the chiaroscuro technique used by the old masters. However, I use light and dark more intuitively, to achieve my immediate expressive ends, rather than as a way of duplicating reality. "My drawing ideas have many different sources, but are always tied to emotional cords.
At times, ideas area triggered by something I see that shouts to be drawn. Other times, they are a synthesizing of fragments of my past, my travels or my whimsies and dreams.
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Mixed Media Acrylic Paintings
Aletha first began exploring abstract approaches to painting in 1997 after participating in an experimental painting workshop. Although she has been recognized as an accomplished figurative watercolor painter for the past twenty years, this body of abstract work takes her in a new direction.
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I find the creative process with these abstract paintings to be extremely
intuitive and liberating. I am once again immersed in the exuberant world of the child with finger paint.
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For additional information regarding the artist, please refer to the following publications that feature the artist and her work:
- "International Showcase of Prize Winners" International Artist, Vol.30, p 21, April/May, 2003.
- Jennifer Ball, "Simply the Best" The Artist’s Magazine, p.61, September, 2003.
- Kelly Kane, et al, "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Landscape" Watercolor Magic, p. 44, November, 2000.
- Donna Watson, "Creativity From the Inside Out" The Artist’s Magazine, pp. 40-41, December, 1999.
- The Best of Watercolor 2, Rockport Publishers, 1997, p. 18.
- Aletha Jones,"Sculpting a Watercolor" The Artist’s Magazine, pp. 4, 86-91, March, 1992.
2133 Linden Ave.
Madison, WI 53704-5335
608-249-8948
http://alethajones.com/index.htm
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