“You Were Born with Wings” is a celebration of youth and the planet, delivered to the viewer in a crisp, dynamic, two-dimensional composition that embodies Jones’s overall belief system and passion to create. Bridging cultures, and connecting the threads of humanity and the animal kingdom, her paintings are undeniably rooted in environmental activism.
Jones’s paintings are realistic portraits, both of young people and endangered animals, and sometimes historical figures too. Young people, Jones feels “will inherit the planet that we leave them—and they are also among the strongest and most influential voices in the climate change and animal liberation movements.” She paints on aluminum rather than canvas, and often incorporates gold leaf into the overall composition. Jones says “I love using metal leaf in my paintings for multiple reasons. These metals are of the earth, they are considered ‘precious’, and therefore I feel they give a reverential quality to the subject matter (similar to the Madonna and Child paintings of the Gothic/Proto-Renaissance). I also love, aesthetically, the way the light reflects off the metal, changing as the light in the space shifts.”
