| Jeffrey Catherine Jones | |
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Jeffrey Catherine Jones by Michael Netzer |
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| Born | Jeffrey Durwood Jones January 10, 1944 Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. |
| Died | May 19, 2011 (aged 67) |
| Nationality | American |
| Area(s) | Artist |
| Official website | |
Jeffrey Catherine Jones (born Jeffrey Durwood Jones, January 10, 1944 – May 19, 2011)[1] was an American artist whose work is best known from the late 1960s through 2000s. Jones provided over 150 covers for many different types of books through 1976, as well as venturing into fine art during and after this time. World renowned illustration artist Frank Frazetta called Jones "the greatest living painter".[2] Although Jones first achieved fame as simply Jeff Jones and lived for a time as male, she later changed her name and was legally recognized as female.
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In 1964 while attending Georgia State College, Jones met fellow student Mary Louise Alexander (later Louise Simonson). The two began dating and were married in 1966. Their daughter Julianna was born the following year. After graduation, the couple moved to New York City but split up in the early 1970s.[3]
Jones painted covers for books, including the Ace paperback editions of Fritz Leiber's Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser series and Andre Norton's Postmarked the Stars, The Zero Stone, Uncharted Stars and many others. For a period during the early 1970s she also contributed illustrations to Ted White's Fantastic.
Jones was nominated for the Hugo Award for best fan artist in 1967, and for the best professional artist Hugo in 1970, 1971, and 1972. Jones was nominated for the World Fantasy Award for best artist in 1975, and won the award in 1986. Jones was nominated for the Chesley Award in 1999.[4]
In 1972-75 issues of National Lampoon Jones had a full page strip entitled Idyl. (A strip by Jones, taken from Idyl, was used to illustrate the Sonic Arts Network CD publication Otherness, curated by David Cotner in 2007.) From 1975 to 1979 she shared workspace in Manhattan’s Chelsea district, with Bernie Wrightson, Barry Windsor-Smith, and Michael William Kaluta, collectively named The Studio; Dragon’s Dream produced a volume of their work in 1979. Industry journalist Tom Spurgeon commented on the broader significance and influence of The Studio in his obituary of Jones at The Comics Reporter:
By the early 1980s she had a recurring strip in Heavy Metal titled I'm Age. Cartoonists Walter Simonson and J. D. King said at the time that Jones had a growing interest in expressionism, and did not pursue comic work as closely thereafter.
As an adult, Jones recalled wanting to be a girl from her earliest memories. She confronted these issues in 1998 and began hormone replacement therapy.[6] Comics writer and journalist Steven Ringgenberg elaborated on her transition in an obituary/tribute to Jones at The Comics Journal:
It's now known from the artist’s personal writings that he had felt conflicted about his gender since childhood, always feeling a greater affinity for the fair sex than for his own maleness. Having grown up as a product of the patriarchal 1950s, with a domineering war-hero father, Jones did not know how to cope with his yearning to be female, and felt ashamed. For years he tried to drown these feelings in alcohol, but, after much soul-searching, Jones realized that although he’d been born male, inside he was a woman. He began hormone replacement therapy in 1998, and set out upon a new phase of life as a woman, changing his name to Jeffrey Catherine Jones. Yet even this transition did not bring peace to this gentle, troubled artist, for in 2001, she suffered a nervous breakdown, which led to the loss of her home and studio. However, she eventually recovered, and by 2004 began painting and drawing again.[7]
Similarly, in a tribute in Locus, editor Arnie Fenner described the results of Jones' transition:
Though he lived the rest of his days as a transgendered person he told me candidly in 2006, "It was a mistake. I still think like a man and desire women like a man does. I thought it would make me less depressed and I was wrong. I drove down a dead end road and now I can't back up or turn around; the only thing I can do at this point is accept things as they are. And I think I have. Besides, what other choice do I have?"[8]
Jones' personal Facebook page reported following her death: "Legendary fantasy artist Jeffrey Catherine Jones passed away today, Thursday May 19, 2011 at 4:00 am surrounded by family. Jeffrey suffered from severe emphysema and bronchitis as well as hardening of the arteries around the heart..."[9] She was survived by her daughter.
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