Colorful and Charismatic
The mystifying and magnetic artworks of Erik Jones
Brooklyn based artist Erik Jones is growing in popularity all across the nation. Recently featured on the cover of Hi-Fructose Magazine, Jones’s work is finally getting some of the accolade he deserves. Bright and colorful tornados of painterly abstracti
The mystifying and magnetic artworks of Erik Jones
Brooklyn based artist Erik Jones is growing in popularity all across the nation. Recently featured on the cover of Hi-Fructose Magazine, Jones’s work is finally getting some of the accolade he deserves. Bright and colorful tornados of painterly abstraction paired with gorgeous realistic figures and portraits help give Jones his distinctive style and notorious images. He has been creating art for as long as he can remember, but only a few years ago stepped out of the commercial art world and into fine art royalty immediately.
His female series of paintings are breathtaking. Like colorful lions’ manes around sensual and meticulously detailed faces and bodies, these women are delicate and natural with a wild sense of adventure and art around them.
“I started working with nonrepresentational accents in my work around 2009-2010,” Jones says. “Prior to that I was abstracting the hair on 
figures in decorative ways. That started to become a crutch and I felt as if I was not developing artistically. Not to mention everywhere I looked, I would see a lot of other artist doing something similar.”
His paintings hint at a minimalist sense of high end couture fashion. “I became enthralled with conceptual fashion designer,” he says. “I loved watching runway shows where the model was covered in sculptural type fashion. I think it was the influence of both genres and my need to experiment which led me into what I am doing now.” After finding his artistic voice, the pieces seemed to appear out of nowhere, and they just kept coming. “I stopped dwelling on trying to make money from my art and focused on what I thought was beautiful and impressive,” he says. “In doing so it opened up my art to an entirely new audience. I’m simply doing what I love now!”
His art practice is intriguing. The faces he creates seem so soft and supple, with flawless execution and a sensuality that looks natural and provocative—like the soft smirk on the face of Mona Lisa, you can’t help but wonder what she is thinking about.
“I’ll typically start with watercolor for a base color and render the skin colored pencil, on top of the watercolor, “ he says as he starts to describe his practice. “I then use water-soluble wax pastels on top if the pencil. These allow me to make very smooth gradations and introduce new colors that colored pencils simply can’t produce. When I’m satisfied with the wax pastel, I’ll use water-soluble oil paints on top of the pastel. This is usually done for tinting highlights and shadows—it also smoothes out any imperfections I couldn’t buff out with the pastel. Rest of the piece is done with a few different types of acrylics, each revealing a different look, such at the smudges, drips, textures, etc.”
With two West Coast exhibitions in the books, and the recent success at Scope Fine Art Fair and ArtPad SF Fair, it seems like he’s not slowing down any time soon. Keep an eye open for this art star, and get swept away in his colorful and charismatic creations.
“Let Them Smoke”
Though not a medical cannabis patient, artist Erik Jones says he believes in the accessibility of the medicine. “If people want to smoke, let them smoke. Especially if you’re sick—or just want to relax,” he says. Earlier this month, New York State’s Assembly Codes Committee—by a vote of 16 to 6, approved Assembly Bill 6357 which would legalize the use, possession and transfer of medical cannabis by qualified patients. The measure passed its initial committee, the Assembly Health Committee, by a 21-4 vote last month.
