Jones started out life in Otaki, and went to design school in Wellington upon leaving high school. From there he began creating commission paintings for companies all over the world. He now paints full time, and his works are in personal collections in England, Ireland, North America, Australia and, of course, New Zealand.

The original paintings themselves are incredible. They are significantly larger than their print counterparts, and as a result of this they look striking on the wall. If you have a chance to check them out in person, take advantage. They are shown periodically around Auckland. The main way you will experience a piece of Ross Jones’ work will likely be through his ever popular Giclee prints. On his website, Jones outlines the process he goes through to take his paintings and transform them into a digital print, his reasoning for choosing Giclee and the benefits of him creating his reproductions in this way.

The Giclee printing process is becoming more and more popular as the form for limited edition art reproductions. There are several reason for this, the quality in the finish and the archival, fade resistant inks being huge ticks in the pro’s column. Before Giclee printing, digital limited edition prints were produced in the lithograph printing process. This is what is used to print magazines or posters. It is no where near as robust as Giclee.

Giclee prints still count is individual pieces of art due to them being printed one at a time, making them the digital equivalent of the traditional screen printing process. Jones prints them all himself, giving him complete control over the final product, as well as allowing him to keep the edition numbers lower than he may if he outsourced them. As such, he runs his prints in editions of 49. This combination of the personal touch and low edition numbers gives the prints a feeling of exclusivity that is lost with some limited edition reproductions. He will print, trim, sign and handcraft the final packaging all himself. So from start to finish, he has total control over the final outcome to ensure it it is the best it possibly can be.

On his website, he gives a broad outline of his process from start to finish, painting to print:

Once a painting has thoroughly dried it is carefully delivered across town to be digitally photographed.
Upon receipt of the digital file I adjust the image meticulously to ensure colour accuracy and tonal precision.
Strip tests are printed and compared. In some cases the colours will differ slightly from the original, but the overall colour impression remains true.
When I produce a print it will have its own unique identity—in some cases I’ll change a tone slightly if I think it will enhance the overall look.

To read more about Ross Jones and his process, you can visit his website www.jonesthepainter.com. There you will also find his complete collection of prints. While we keep a good number of these in stock at all times, we don’t have the room for his whole collection! If you find one you absolutely love that we don’t have, we can order it in for you. This makes the framing process nice and easy (and means you get a discount off the framing too). Just give us a call, flick us an email or pop in store if you have any questions!

All information on Ross Jones and his process is sourced from his website, www.jonesthepainter.com