Francis Coates Jones
1857-1932
Francis Coates Jones was born in Baltimore, Maryland in 1857.
He first expressed an interest in art in 1876 when visiting Edwin Abbey. Jones and his brother, H. Bolton Jones, a painter of landscapes, then worked at Pont-Aven, Brittany in an artistic colony attended by Robert Wylie and Thomas Hovenden. Pont-Aven would soon become famous for Paul Gauguin painting there.
Francis Coates Jones was genre figure painter who specialized in scenes set in interiors, opulently decorated with elaborate furniture and accessories. His work was at once richly painted and academically precise, reflecting a style that was eventually influenced by impressionism, as in Won't Play (1880, Museum of Fine Arts, Springfield).
Jones first demonstrated an interest in art when visiting Edwin Austine Abbey in 1876. Traveling with his brother, landscape painter H. Bolton Jones, Francis Jones spent a year at the artists' colony in Pont-Aven, Brittany with such artists as Thomas Hovenden and Robert Wylie.
In the autumn of 1877, Jones went to Paris to enroll at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. He worked in the antique class under Henri Lehmann, traveling and sketching in France, Switzerland and Italy during the next five years.
During The winter of 1879 to 1880, Jones was in London, working on a military panorama. Returning to France, he continued his studies under the direction of William Alolphe Bouguereau and Jules Joseph Lefebvre, and attended a special class at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts.
As an illustrator, Jones did views of historic houses in Washington for Scribner's (October 1893). Beginning in 1895, he worked as a mural painter. He also taught at the National Academy of Design and spent summers painting in the Berkshire Mountains of South Egremont, Mass.
Although his paintings reflected contemporary scenes, Jones interest in costumes and decorative objects was always apparent.
He was also a mural painter, commencing in 1895. He died in 1932.
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