ARTIST SPOTLIGHT: CHLOE JONES
A Northwest Arkansas native, Chloe Jones’s photography has always been closely informed by home. Her work’s subject matter, which includes stylized scenes and portraits, are typically set against the backdrop of the Ozarks. These images feel strikingly real, familiar and familial, as if she took a page from your family’s photo album. An MFA student at The University of Hartford in New York, Jones’s work continues to evolve as a tribute to the liminal space of her upbringing and a discernment to revisit and occupy it. MIXD is thrilled to continue to showcase Jones’s work in Drop 006 and to get a glimpse into her practice in the conversation below.
MIXD: How has life in Arkansas influenced your work?
Chloe Jones: When I was very young, my Poppa built a house on Beaver Lake with his family and friends. He made a photo album documenting the process of our family physically transforming the house from a barn for animals to a multigenerational home. The album is lined in velvet, and was (and is still) treated like a talisman. This album provided a formative experience of photography as critical to our family history; it is an attentive record of how our family is inextricably tied to this place. I’m interested in how land shapes people, and people shape the land. Most of my work is still made in and around this house.
There’s a defect in the wood beam leading up the stairs that perfectly fits my index finger. As I round the corner, I’ll place my finger inside, and let the house give me a little squeeze.
CHLOE JONES
MIXD: Can you tell us a bit about your artist’s practice? Where does it often begin?
CJ: At the beginning there is some research and foundational knowledge of what or who has come before me in the medium and in my subject matter. However, I eventually have to cut myself off of the research stage, or I’ll go on forever without making. My practice is driven by simply making work. Intuition comes through the experience of laboring; the practice itself provides the experience. So, there’s a lot of work punctuated by small breakthroughs. Most of these come from an accident, then picking up on that accident. When I go to make work with a set idea or concept, I’m much less excited by the resulting images. I don’t want to know what I already know. I want the work to take me somewhere, or teach me something through the process of making it.
I try to make images that are never fully stable. When things are moving I like to respond and make visual sense of it right before it falls apart. I am serious about chasing a gesture or a bug. I do this not to advance a specific story, but to give a sense of time and place and who they are in the fleeting present.
I try to be there, with them, and I try to be honest.
To my subjects (my family) I’m not a photographer, I’m ‘Chloe,’ and they are not typecast by me, but distinct individuals. I think that the power of the ‘snapshot’ lies not so much in the style or subject as in the relationship between photographer and photographed.
MIXD: Do you have a favorite project or memory as an artist?
CJ: In the first grade, I worked really hard on an art project for school. I won a contest for the piece I made, and my art teacher told me, “Chloe, this is very creative.” It’s this strong, flashbulb memory my brain holds onto. I believe this shaped ideas I hold about myself and my identity. Sometimes, I think, if I had won a science fair instead, would I be a scientist now?
I try to make images that are never fully stable. When things are moving I like to respond and make visual sense of it right before it falls apart. I am serious about chasing a gesture or a bug. I do this not to advance a specific story, but to give a sense of time and place and who they are in the fleeting present.
CHLOE JONES
I try to be there, with them, and I try to be honest.
A very warm thank you to Chloe Jones for entrusting MIXD Gallery to showcase her work and for joining us in conversation. If you’re interested in viewing more of Chloe’s pieces you can find details HERE.
Article Credits
Copy, Nicole Boddington; Gallery Photography, Henry O. Head