Jones is an English painter, sculptor and printmaker. He studied at Hornsey College of Art, London (1955-9, 1960-61), spending 1959-60 at the Royal College of Art, where he was associated with the rise of Pop art. He was expelled from the Royal College of Art in 1960, at the end of his first year.
While living in New York he discovered a rich fund of imagery in sexually motivated popular illustration of the 1940’s and 1950’s. From then on, in paintings such as Perfect Match he made explicit the previously subdued eroticism, adopting a precise linear style as a means of emphasising tactility. The full extent of his Pop sensibility emerged in sexually provocative fibreglass sculptures such as Chair, life-size images of women as furniture with fetishist and sado-masochist overtones.
In the mid 1970’s he focused on a more painterly conception in canvases such as Santa Monica Shores and to a playful stylisation in figure sculptures, notably The Tango, a larger than life-size dancing couple made from polychrome steel plate. Lithography, in which his output was prolific, proved an appropriate medium for his graphic flair. Among his publications are Figures and Projects, the latter including his designs for stage, film and television.
His work is held in important collections worldwide and the Royal Academy held a major retrospective of his work in 2014.
