Janet Jones
I'm a mixed media artist, with a background in painting, graphic design and printmaking. My design background has given me a lasting love of letter forms, language and the printed word, and this informs much of my work. I love working with old books and documents, especially those in languages I don't know. Having lived in San Francisco for most of my adult life, I've been influenced by the city's strong Asian presence, and much of my recent work employs wonderful old Japanese and Chinese materials.
I want to draw attention to the innate beauty of the stains, foxing and velvety patina of old book pages and the grime and grunge of "road kill" papers rescued from the street. Sometimes these found papers are finished pieces with very little intervention on my part, and in other cases I distress papers by soaking, laminating, staining, scorching and sanding to give them still more history. I take pleasure in giving these humble materials the loving presentation they deserve.