Friday, October 10, 1986
"Works evoke images of crumbling antiquity"
By Martha Kennelly, Correspondent
Breathless from trundling a wheelbarrow full of cobblestones,
sculptor Patricia Bengtson-Jones straightens her back and rubs
the sweat from her forehead. Nearby lay the long handled spade
she used to cut strips of turf to install on of her site-specific works
in the front lawn of Haywards Sun Gallery. Aided by a collaborator,
Dana Chodzko, Jones is constructing "Hadrian's Corner."
Translation: She's creating the appearance of an ancient monument,
a corner of some acient building emerging after centuries of being
buriend underground. " The pressures of time working from
underneath are forcing it up through the grass, out of the earth"
she explains...Inside the gallery, her six small bronzes, patinated
to suggest age, stand on pedestals. Fragmentary like the site
sculpture, their classic columns lean in disrepair, marble shards
scattered nearby...I'm very interested in people of past civilizations
and cultures -- and that's what I'm depicting."
41 Powell Street, San Francisco, CA 94102
September 8 - October 17, 1987
Patricia Bengtson Jones' ruins have architectural order, but the age of
elements disarrange the balance. This is what attracts her to the form.
She uses concepts of prehistoric monumental stone sites she
located in 1979 and 1980 in England and Italy. She likes to express to
others her own relationship to these historic primal forms of sculpture.
Patricia uses monolithic forms and stacking or layering to denote time
past, while working with the elements (earth, water, sun and stone) to
bring unityto the work of art. Also, she searches to achieve that which
continues to lure the scientist, the traveller and the artist to various
parts of the globe In their endless search to shed some light on the
unexplained phenomena of past cultures.
Marble and Sandstone
8" x 10.5" x 15.5"
1979
1641 Locust Street, Walnut Creek, CA 94596
STONE
Nine Northern California Sculptors
September 5 through October 20, 1985
Pat Jones' use of monolithic forms and stacking or layering denote
times past and reflect "the influence of prehistoric, monumental
stone sites visited in England and Italy." Her work has been shown
in one-prson and group exhibitions in the Bay Area and in Europe.
Jones received her B.A. and M.A. from San Jose State University,
and has also studied in Italy. She currently lives and works in Berkeley.
Italian Marble,
73" x 17" x 16"
1985
Thursday, October 27, 1983
DATEBOOK
100 S.F. Artists Open Up Their Studios
ART
Thomas Albright
..Patricia Bengtson Jones, whose studio is in the old brewery off the railroad tracks at the end of
(155) Florida Street, is a sculptor who works primarily with marble. Sometimes she stacks flat,
irregular, flagstone-like pieces of marble and cement, their surfaces inscribed with "personal signs,"
into slender vertical columns. Her more effective works occupy pedestals, carved in classical forms,
and comprise chunky blocks of raw, unpolished stone in relationships that suggest miniature ruins...
Walnut Creek, CA 1988
Women in Metal and Stone
Unusual Materials Mark Exhibit of Six Sculptors' Work
by Carol Fowler, Art Critic
...Patricia Bengtson Jones contrasts polished planes and natural stone
surfaces in her stone sculptures which look like Japanese Zen
temples or grdens. working in Carrara marble, Virginia soapstone
and dental plaster, she may cut a small starway into one side of the
piece that leads to a polished surface inset with contrasting rocks.
A large, white floor piece is a simple pyramidal form of contrasting
surfaces. The smaller "Plaza of Villa Di Leo" is more Japanese than
Italian, and wonderfully elegant...
Sunday, February 19, 1989
Stone Sculptures Demonstrate Skill
By Merrill Schleler
...Patricia Bengtson-Jones' sculptures simulate monuments. Carved to imitate weathered stone,
her works stand as archeological remnants of cultures past.
Clearly, Bengtson-Jones associates marble with the high points of civilization, now ravaged by time.
In "Historic Fragments," she connects diverse eroded slabs with coarse plaster, which threaten to
come unglued, suggesting that even mightly stone can crumble into dust...
Sculpture in Public Places
Patricia Bengtson Jones' ruins have
architectural order, but the age of elements
disarrange the balance. This is what attracts
her to the form. She uses concepts of
prehistoric monumental stone sites she
located in 1979 and 1980 in England and Italy.
She likes to express to others her own
relationship to these historic primal forms
of sculpture. Patricia uses monolithic forms
and stacking or layering to denote time past,
while working with the elements (earth, water,
sun and stone) to bring unity to the work of art.
Also, she searches to achieve that which
continues to lure the scientist, the traveller
and the artist to various parts of the globe.
In their endless search to shed some light on
the unexplained phenomena of past cultures.
Carara Marble
28" x 8" x 6.75"
1989