Ragged Claws Network

The cavalcade of covers by Jeffrey Jones continues, though the pace is slowing…

Click here to view the entire collection (so far).

The original reproduction on many of the following covers by Jeffrey Jones, all from the library of yours truly, was very poor, so my scans are sometimes not the best here. One exception is the last cover, Twilight of the Serpent, which actually showcases Jones’s artwork in more detail and with more lively colour than does the rather dour reproduction on the back cover of publisher Underwood-Miller’s lavish hardcover, The Art of Jeffrey Jones.

My favourites this time around are the covers for The Curse of Rathlaw (1968), an early effort in which Jones’s attractive design for the vignette is nicely reinforced by the typography, and Twilight of the Serpent (1977), a later cover which displays Jones’s hard-won skills as a draftsman (or draughtsman, if you prefer), mastery of lost-and-found edges in oil painting, and increasing willingness in the 1970s and early 1980s to produce images that went against the grain of traditional heroic fantasy.

The following cover by Jones is from the Skywald horror magazine, Nightmare, volume 1, number 6 (December 1971):

Jones’s Scheherazade graced the cover of the Styx #2 back in 1973 (37 years ago!):

Styx was published by Winnipeg’s own Joseph Krolik, who was very active in fandom beginning in the mid-to-late 1960s, when he and a buddy, Andris Taskans, both in high school at the time, started a club called “The Science Fiction Fans & Comic Collectors of Winnipeg” and published a “clubzine” called Universe that ran for seven issues.

Even though I don’t much care for any of the above covers, I have decided to include them here anyway for what they reveal about Jones’s slow but steady development as an artist.

Todd Adams of Glimmer Graphics has a beautiful new limited edition print by Jeffrey Jones available for purchase on his company’s Web site. “I have published over 50 fine art prints through the years,” writes Todd, “and this is the finest print quality I have seen to date.” Here’s a link to the order page. And here’s a copy of the image Todd sent out to promote the print:

Jones created the above painting for Meisha Merlin Publishing’s deluxe limited edition of the first book in George R. R. Martin’s “A Song of Fire & Ice” epic. The new Glimmer Graphics print is comprised of 375 signed and numbered copies, as well as 25 artist proof copies, all on 500 g/m² acid-free, ultra-smooth paper. Sheet size is 22 x 16 inches, with an image size of 19 x 12.5 inches.

BONUS LINK:

Work in Progress: The A Game of Thrones Cover by Jeffrey Jones

Yes, there are some serious creases and wear marks on some of the covers, but it is difficult to find pristine copies of thirty-nine-year-old-plus paperbacks, especially when one limits one’s search to local bookstores:

I don’t really like any of the above covers, with the exception, perhaps, of the Uncharted Stars cover, which I feel is a step up from the others in terms of draftsmanship, composition, technique, originality, and wit.

You are definitely going to want to “Click Image to Enlarge” this one:

On 02 August 2007, the above painting sold at auction for US$17,327.50.

BONUS LINK:

Mr. Door Tree Presents: Jeff Jones: A Group of His Early Paintings, 1968 – 1980

Jones really began to hit his stride as a skilled cover artist with a distinctive stylistic sensibility in the early 1970s:

I don’t much care for any of these covers from 1968 and 1969, but since I have yet to break out of the collector/completist mentality — and believe me, I’ve tried — here they are, scanned and posted for your “enjoyment”:

To make up for the lacklustre art this time round, my next post will feature two covers by Jones from the early 1970s that I think are very strong, along with one that I have mixed feelings about, so stay tuned for that!

If you have been following my posts over the past few days, you’ll already know why I decided the time was right to scan and post this:

If you have not been following along, click here to jump to my post on Lucian Freud’s The Painter Surprised by a Naked Admirer.

Further selections from a growing collection of brittle books that I’ve purchased just so I could scan the covers, post them here, lean back in my chair, and admire my own busywork:

The main thing to notice here is the improvement in Jones’s compositions, draftsmanship, and paint handling, from 1968 to 1971. There’s an awful lot of fudging going on in those covers from 1968 and 1969! There’s noticeably less fudging in the 1971 covers, however, which are not only very good in themselves but point the way to Jones’s terrific mid-1970s work for Zebra/Kensington and others.