Artist and author Robert Jones was born in Cornwall; the beaches and cliffs of Newquay were his childhood playground. His seascapes and marine subjects are particularly well known.
He studied painting with Francis Hewlett and Robert Organ at Falmouth College of Art and continued to paint whilst teaching in various schools including three-years at A.S. Neill’s Summerhill School. On returning to Cornwall, he continued to draw and paint throughout a spell as skipper of fishing boats, working around the Cornish coast before becoming a part-time tutor at Penzance Art School and Falmouth College of Art.
He spent seven years fishing around the coast of west Cornwall, which gave him an intimate knowledge of the sea. His paintings are concerned with atmosphere, changing weather and light conditions on land and at sea.
Robert spent a number of years teaching in schools, but a successful exhibition at Newlyn Orion Art Gallery encouraged him to concentrate on his painting and reduce his teaching commitments.
His paintings have been widely exhibited throughout the UK and abroad.
A series of his sea paintings was included in the second exhibition at Tate St. Ives. He is represented in a small number of galleries in Cornwall but has recently acquired a small gallery space/showroom in Hayle; Carnsew Studio.
In 1995 he began researching the life and work of the artist Alfred Wallis, and in 2000 his book, ‘Alfred Wallis Artist and Mariner’ was published to critical acclaim. The fourth enlarged and expanded edition was published in 2021.