Ashton Lacy Jones

Ashton says that for her, the creative process is just that– process driven. She wants to see how far she can push a medium, to see if she can make the wild idea in her imagination come to fruition.  Art speak and theory hold little sway with her, as she would rather talk to you about how the art was physically created. In Ashton’s experience, the creation of art is very much a call and response process – the art itself, a mark, line, a color calls to her, and she responds.

For silk screen and encaustic prints, Ashton’s process begins with a photograph. She then burns the photograph into a silk screen, and begins to build the bones of the print. Using an encaustic medium on a large heated plate allows Ashton to incorporate additional color, marks, and images to the paper.  Finally, she begins to layer additional screen printing, stenciling, pencil marks and even more encaustic to build the final composition.

Ashton’s assemblages begin by responding to left-over scrap metal collected from another artist.  Using only the shapes and colors of these pieces of metal as found, she begins to build the assemblage. These pieces are created on a hard substrate, most often wood, and the wax worked with a blow torch.  In these works, the encaustic allows for three-dimensional work, gouging, texture, mark making, and translucent layering. 

Born and raised in Miami, Florida, Ashton grew up in an environment where color vibrated and pulsed all around her.  She fell in  love with the surprise of an unexpected color combination, a juxtaposition she had not imagined and the journey of discovering what those colors sparked in her. She tries  to see if she can capture that immediacy and hold firm that flicker of inspiration. Ashton often dances in the studio when color and shape come together to create something larger than her conscious imagination could have composed.  Those are moments of divine intervention. 

While she has been creating art in various forms throughout her life,  it was not until 2010 when Ashton naturally reversed serious health conditions by quitting the practice of law and switched to creating art on a full-time basis.

tags:solo,current