CAMPUS

Marcello MelisAndrew GinzelOculus, New York City1999Three hundred mosaic eyes, ofstone and glass, peer at passersbyin the World Trade Center–ParkPlace subway station.and describes a weeklong meditation retreat she attendedand spent her senior year abroad at St. Martin’s School ofwhere “there were ninety people, and no one said aArt in London. “I had a powerful reaction to the sculptureword.” She does not meditate to generate ideas. “It’sdepartment there,” she said. The volume of air and lightabout being part of a larger whole, listening to the uni-beneath St. Martin’s fourteen-foot ceilings inspired her toverse. It’s an act of respect to yourself.”work in thread. “I kept looking up at the light, thinking, ‘IfJones first began discovering herself as an artist inI could only get up there . . .’” Finally, she took a ladderhigh school, where she experienced the artist’s passion inand climbed to the classroom ceiling, constructing a floor-a Concord Academy class with Teacher Emerita Janetto-ceiling thread sculpture. “It was like a rain of threads,”Eisendrath. “She actually managed to bring the entireshe remembered.class into a state of rapture,” Jones said. “She’s the onlyJones later received her MFA at Yale, whereteacher in my life who brought a class to tears. That takesrenowned professor Vincent Scully told her, “If you’rea lot of eloquence. Janet shared with us her knowledgeinterested in public space, you must go to Rome.” On herand wonder of art; she shared with us the power of art tofirst Fulbright, in 1983, she studied the interplay of publicstimulate an emotional reaction.”space and water there. The Rome Prize allowed herBack then, however, Jones was a bit preoccupied.return with collaborator Ginzel in 1994–95. In 2001, sheShe had learned at age twelve that her diplomat fatherreturned to Rome on a senior Fulbright.C O N C O R D A C A D E M Y M A G A Z I N E F A L L 2 0 0 926was a spy, and she was warned never to mention it,though she discusses it openly now. Her heart wouldquiver if a CA classmate said, “Do you have your CA ID?”thinking she had heard “CIA.” Jones had been utterlyunprepared when she learned her father’s secret, during amemorable family lunch in Norway. “I’m genuinely naïve,to this day,” she said.After Concord Academy, Jones studied ceramics andsculpture at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD),And she has returned repeatedly since then. Romeis a muse for Jones and a platform for the ephemeral. “Iam interested in light and air and the sheer intangibility ofthe living moment,” said Jones. She is like an interpreter,seeing a space and its context as a medium throughwhich to channel her vision.Art in Jones’ eye is both perception and transmission,an opportunity to convey an essence that is notreadily apparent.