Leonard Jonah Jones
Encyclopedia
Jonah Jones was born Leonard Jones in the north east of England, but known as a Welsh
sculptor
, writer
and artist-craftsman. He worked in many media, but is especially remembered as a sculptor in stone, lettering-artist and calligrapher.
The eldest of four children, Jones was born in 1919 near Wardley, Tyne and Wear
. His father was a local man who had been a coalminer before being invalided in the First World War, his mother came from Yorkshire
.
Registering in the Second World War as a conscientious objector
, Jonah Jones was enlisted in the British Army
as a non-combatant
. He served in 224 Parachute Field Ambulance, within the 6th Airborne Division, taking part in the Ardennes
campaign and the airdrop over the Rhine at Wesel
in March 1945.
Following demobilisation in 1947, Jones' career began in a shared practice with the artist John Petts in North Wales
, followed soon after by a short, intensive stay at the workshop of the late Eric Gill
, where he learned the techniques of lettering and carving in stone.
During the 1950s Jones established a full-time workshop practice, one of the few who were able at that time in Wales to earn a living solely from art.
, carved in stone
and produced bronze
busts
. He taught himself both the traditional techniques of stained and leaded glass
and the newer ones of concrete glass. He painted in watercolour, a medium in which he produced a distinctive body of work based on vernacular calligraphy, a technique in which the artist and poet David Jones
was a major influence. He also produced two published novels, a book of largely autobiographical essays, an illustrated book about the lakes of North Wales, and a biography of Clough Williams-Ellis
, the architect of Portmeirion
.
Jonah Jones's major public commissions include work for the chapels of Ratcliffe College
, Leicestershire
; Ampleforth College
, North Yorkshire
; and Loyola Hall, Rainhill
, Merseyside
; St Patrick's Catholic church, Newport
, Monmouth
; the National Museum of Wales, Cardiff
; Coleg Harlech
, Gwynedd
; and Mold
Crown Court
, Flintshire
. His private work is marked by a preoccupation with Christian
imagery and biblical themes (particularly that of Jacob
), the Welsh
mythological tales of the Mabinogion
, the landscape of North Wales, and the Word.
He found time, too, to work in the field of art education, acting as external assessor to many colleges of art throughout the UK during the 1960s and 1970s, culminating in a four-year period as director of Dublin’s National College of Art and Design
, 1974–1978, a period in which he was also a director of the Kilkenny
Design Workshops.
His treatment of Welsh subject matter and working of Welsh-language texts were abiding themes throughout his half-century career in Wales.
Wales
Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...
sculptor
Sculpture
Sculpture is three-dimensional artwork created by shaping or combining hard materials—typically stone such as marble—or metal, glass, or wood. Softer materials can also be used, such as clay, textiles, plastics, polymers and softer metals...
, writer
Writer
A writer is a person who produces literature, such as novels, short stories, plays, screenplays, poetry, or other literary art. Skilled writers are able to use language to portray ideas and images....
and artist-craftsman. He worked in many media, but is especially remembered as a sculptor in stone, lettering-artist and calligrapher.
Life
Tyne and Wear
Tyne and Wear is a metropolitan county in north east England around the mouths of the Rivers Tyne and Wear. It came into existence as a metropolitan county in 1974 after the passage of the Local Government Act 1972...
. His father was a local man who had been a coalminer before being invalided in the First World War, his mother came from Yorkshire
Yorkshire
Yorkshire is a historic county of northern England and the largest in the United Kingdom. Because of its great size in comparison to other English counties, functions have been increasingly undertaken over time by its subdivisions, which have also been subject to periodic reform...
.
Registering in the Second World War as a conscientious objector
Conscientious objector
A conscientious objector is an "individual who has claimed the right to refuse to perform military service" on the grounds of freedom of thought, conscience, and/or religion....
, Jonah Jones was enlisted in the British Army
British Army
The British Army is the land warfare branch of Her Majesty's Armed Forces in the United Kingdom. It came into being with the unification of the Kingdom of England and Scotland into the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. The new British Army incorporated Regiments that had already existed in England...
as a non-combatant
Non-combatant
Non-combatant is a term in the law of war describing civilians not taking a direct part in hostilities, as well as persons such as medical personnel and military chaplains who are regular soldiers but are protected because of their function as well as soldiers who are hors de combat ; that is, sick,...
. He served in 224 Parachute Field Ambulance, within the 6th Airborne Division, taking part in the Ardennes
Ardennes
The Ardennes is a region of extensive forests, rolling hills and ridges formed within the Givetian Ardennes mountain range, primarily in Belgium and Luxembourg, but stretching into France , and geologically into the Eifel...
campaign and the airdrop over the Rhine at Wesel
Wesel
Wesel is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is the capital of the Wesel district.-Division of the town:Suburbs of Wesel include Lackhausen, Obrighoven, Ginderich, Feldmark,Fusternberg, Büderich, Flüren and Blumenkamp.-History:...
in March 1945.
Following demobilisation in 1947, Jones' career began in a shared practice with the artist John Petts in North Wales
North Wales
North Wales is the northernmost unofficial region of Wales. It is bordered to the south by the counties of Ceredigion and Powys in Mid Wales and to the east by the counties of Shropshire in the West Midlands and Cheshire in North West England...
, followed soon after by a short, intensive stay at the workshop of the late Eric Gill
Eric Gill
Arthur Eric Rowton Gill was a British sculptor, typeface designer, stonecutter and printmaker, who was associated with the Arts and Crafts movement...
, where he learned the techniques of lettering and carving in stone.
During the 1950s Jones established a full-time workshop practice, one of the few who were able at that time in Wales to earn a living solely from art.
Art
Jonah Jones worked in many media. He cut letters in slateSlate
Slate is a fine-grained, foliated, homogeneous metamorphic rock derived from an original shale-type sedimentary rock composed of clay or volcanic ash through low-grade regional metamorphism. The result is a foliated rock in which the foliation may not correspond to the original sedimentary layering...
, carved in stone
Rock (geology)
In geology, rock or stone is a naturally occurring solid aggregate of minerals and/or mineraloids.The Earth's outer solid layer, the lithosphere, is made of rock. In general rocks are of three types, namely, igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic...
and produced bronze
Bronze
Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal...
busts
Bust (sculpture)
A bust is a sculpted or cast representation of the upper part of the human figure, depicting a person's head and neck, as well as a variable portion of the chest and shoulders. The piece is normally supported by a plinth. These forms recreate the likeness of an individual...
. He taught himself both the traditional techniques of stained and leaded glass
Leaded glass
Leaded glass may refer to:*Lead glass, potassium silicate glass which has been impregnated with a small amount of lead oxide in its fabrication...
and the newer ones of concrete glass. He painted in watercolour, a medium in which he produced a distinctive body of work based on vernacular calligraphy, a technique in which the artist and poet David Jones
David Jones (poet)
David Jones CH was both a painter and one of the first generation British modernist poets. As a painter he worked chiefly in watercolor, painting portraits and animal, landscape, legendary and religious subjects. He was also a wood-engraver and designer of inscriptions. As a writer he was...
was a major influence. He also produced two published novels, a book of largely autobiographical essays, an illustrated book about the lakes of North Wales, and a biography of Clough Williams-Ellis
Clough Williams-Ellis
Sir Bertram Clough Williams-Ellis, CBE, MC was an English-born Welsh architect known chiefly as creator of the Italianate village of Portmeirion in North Wales.-Origins, education and early career:...
, the architect of Portmeirion
Portmeirion
Portmeirion is a popular tourist village in Gwynedd, North Wales. It was designed and built by Sir Clough Williams-Ellis between 1925 and 1975 in the style of an Italian village and is now owned by a charitable trust....
.
Ratcliffe College
Ratcliffe College is an independent Catholic boarding and day school in Leicestershire, England. The College, situated in of parkland on the Fosse Way about six miles north of Leicester, was founded on the instructions of Blessed Father Antonio Rosmini-Serbati in 1845 as a seminary. In 1847, the...
, Leicestershire
Leicestershire
Leicestershire is a landlocked county in the English Midlands. It takes its name from the heavily populated City of Leicester, traditionally its administrative centre, although the City of Leicester unitary authority is today administered separately from the rest of Leicestershire...
; Ampleforth College
Ampleforth College
Ampleforth College in North Yorkshire, England, is the largest Roman Catholic co-educational boarding independent school in the United Kingdom. It opened in 1802, as a boys' school, and is run by the Benedictine monks and lay staff of Ampleforth Abbey...
, North Yorkshire
North Yorkshire
North Yorkshire is a non-metropolitan or shire county located in the Yorkshire and the Humber region of England, and a ceremonial county primarily in that region but partly in North East England. Created in 1974 by the Local Government Act 1972 it covers an area of , making it the largest...
; and Loyola Hall, Rainhill
Rainhill
Rainhill is a large village and civil parish of the Metropolitan Borough of St Helens, in Merseyside, England.Historically a part of Lancashire, Rainhill was formerly a township within the ecclesiastical parish of Prescot, and hundred of West Derby...
, Merseyside
Merseyside
Merseyside is a metropolitan county in North West England, with a population of 1,365,900. It encompasses the metropolitan area centred on both banks of the lower reaches of the Mersey Estuary, and comprises five metropolitan boroughs: Knowsley, St Helens, Sefton, Wirral, and the city of Liverpool...
; St Patrick's Catholic church, Newport
Newport
Newport is a city and unitary authority area in Wales. Standing on the banks of the River Usk, it is located about east of Cardiff and is the largest urban area within the historic county boundaries of Monmouthshire and the preserved county of Gwent...
, Monmouth
Monmouth
Monmouth is a town in southeast Wales and traditional county town of the historic county of Monmouthshire. It is situated close to the border with England, where the River Monnow meets the River Wye with bridges over both....
; the National Museum of Wales, Cardiff
Cardiff
Cardiff is the capital, largest city and most populous county of Wales and the 10th largest city in the United Kingdom. The city is Wales' chief commercial centre, the base for most national cultural and sporting institutions, the Welsh national media, and the seat of the National Assembly for...
; Coleg Harlech
Coleg Harlech
Coleg Harlech is a further education college for mature students in Harlech, Gwynedd.It is Wales' only long-term, mature students education college and was established in 1927 by Thomas Jones , Cabinet Secretary to both David Lloyd George and Stanley Baldwin, to continue the work of Workers'...
, Gwynedd
Gwynedd
Gwynedd is a county in north-west Wales, named after the old Kingdom of Gwynedd. Although the second biggest in terms of geographical area, it is also one of the most sparsely populated...
; and Mold
Mold, Flintshire
Mold is a town in Flintshire, North Wales, on the River Alyn. It is the administrative seat of Flintshire County Council, and was also the county town of Clwyd from 1974 to 1996...
Crown Court
Crown Court
The Crown Court of England and Wales is, together with the High Court of Justice and the Court of Appeal, one of the constituent parts of the Senior Courts of England and Wales...
, Flintshire
Flintshire
Flintshire is a county in north-east Wales. It borders Denbighshire, Wrexham and the English county of Cheshire. It is named after the historic county of Flintshire, which had notably different borders...
. His private work is marked by a preoccupation with Christian
Christian
A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...
imagery and biblical themes (particularly that of Jacob
Jacob
Jacob "heel" or "leg-puller"), also later known as Israel , as described in the Hebrew Bible, the Talmud, the New Testament and the Qur'an was the third patriarch of the Hebrew people with whom God made a covenant, and ancestor of the tribes of Israel, which were named after his descendants.In the...
), the Welsh
Wales
Wales is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain, bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km²...
mythological tales of the Mabinogion
Mabinogion
The Mabinogion is the title given to a collection of eleven prose stories collated from medieval Welsh manuscripts. The tales draw on pre-Christian Celtic mythology, international folktale motifs, and early medieval historical traditions...
, the landscape of North Wales, and the Word.
National College of Art and Design
The National College of Art and Design is a national art and design school in Dublin, Ireland.-History:Situated on Thomas Street, the NCAD started as a private drawing school and has become a national institution educating over 1,500 day and evening students as artists, designers and art educators...
, 1974–1978, a period in which he was also a director of the Kilkenny
Kilkenny
Kilkenny is a city and is the county town of the eponymous County Kilkenny in Ireland. It is situated on both banks of the River Nore in the province of Leinster, in the south-east of Ireland...
Design Workshops.
His treatment of Welsh subject matter and working of Welsh-language texts were abiding themes throughout his half-century career in Wales.
Selected writings
- A Tree May Fall, Bodley Head, 1980, ISBN 0370303202
- The Lakes of North Wales, Whittet Books, 1983, ISBN 0905483545
- Zorn, William Heinemann Ltd, 1987, ISBN 0434377341
- The Gallipoli Diary, Seren Books/Poetry Wales Pr Ltd, 1989, ISBN 1854110101
- Clough Williams-Ellis: Architect of Portmeirion, Seren Publishing, 1997, ISBN 1854112147
External links
- Scene & Word - Cofio Jonah Jones - biography and image collection of Jones' work
- Jonah Jones obituary, Guardian
- Jonah Jones obituary, The Independent