Alvey Jones
painter, printmaker, book artist

The Secrets of Modern Art
Signification, Appropriation and Metaphor


The Secrets of Modern Art by Michael Thoresen
mixed media assemblage
15"h x 12"w

September 25 - November 4, 2007

Opening Reception:

Friday, October 5, 7-9 pm

WSG Gallery is pleased to present an exhibition of new paintings, assemblages, collages and prints by Ann Arbor artist Alvey Jones that explores contemporary notions of metaphor, appropriation and representation. Jones' works are intensely personal, deeply textured and multi-layered critical reactions to aesthetics, politics, the history of artistic technique and the puzzles of modern and post-modern practice.

In several works, Jones asks how far appropriation or metaphor can be pushed and still remain valid and viable avenues of artistic expression. Embedded in the series are clues to the artist’s relationship to the history of art and to other artists. Each piece looks carefully planned, yet hidden in the details are Jones' familiar questions about how the process of making art should be pursued and how chance events and strokes of whimsy can communicate intriguing ideas to the viewer.

Jones worked professionally as an artist, graphic designer and illustrator in Peoria and Urbana, Illinois; Phoenix, Arizona; and in New York City before moving to Ann Arbor in 1990. His work has been shown locally and nationally and is in many public and private collections in this country and Europe. He earned his BFA at Bradley Unversity in Peoria, an MA at Arizona State University and did graduate work in art history at the University of Illinois.

This is Jones' third solo exhibit at the Washington Street Gallery. His first exhibit, The Mystery of Flight, was in September 2003, and his second, As Time Goes By: Scenes from Famous Motion Pictures, was in September 2005. There will be an opening reception to meet the artist on Friday, October 5, from 7-9 pm.

The Poetry of Dust We Cannot Sense
mixed-media assemblage
24"h x 18"w
by Alvey Jones

To Hell with Metaphor. Let's See a Literal Depiction of the History of Modern Art
mixed-media assemblage
12"h x 31"w
by Alvey Jones

Logic and Metaphor
mixed-media on board
24"h x 18"w
by Alvey Jones