Today we’d like to introduce you to Cassandra C. Jones.
Hi Cassandra, so excited to have you with us today. What can you tell us about your story?
I discovered Taft Gardens and Nature Preserve in 2014 while tagging along with my husband, the keyboardist for the band Wilco, who was looking for a location to shoot a music video for a side project. A friend told him about this secret garden with Australian and South African plants hidden in the hills of Ojai, which he obtained special permission to visit. While he was off scouting, I wandered around the gardens, trying to figure out what this place was. It felt like a park but also like someone’s yard, a strange ven-diagram of public and private space. While in the Australian Garden, I discovered an enormous seed pod on the ground that had fallen from a Banksia tree (I did not know the name at the time). It was a deep grey color, oblong in shape, and covered end to end with what I could only describe as muppet mouths. It seemed alien, but it also reminded me of shapes I have used in my art. Something about it made me think, “I have to do a project here,” then I closed my eyes and made a wish on the pod for an opportunity to present itself. At the time, I did not know anyone who worked at Taft, and it did not seem easily accessible. I was also a new mom and busier than ever in my art career. After we left that day, I forgot about it for six years.
Fast-forward to September 2020, early days of the pandemic. I had been in our home with restless children and my husband, who could not tour, for six months. I was doom-scrolling all day and going out of my mind in lockdown. One morning, I had an idea for an environmental art project based on botany and thought of Taft Gardens. I am a digital collage artist and wanted to make a series of prints about plastic pollution and how there are so many nano-plastics in our soil that the natural world is literally absorbing the human world on a subatomic level.
At that moment, without overthinking it, I sat down and wrote an unsolicited proposal outlining my project and asking for three months of garden access to flush out my idea.
I then sheepishly presented the document to the Garden Coordinator, who happened to live next door to my studio in Ojai. My timing was spot on. The Taft staff had just been discussing creating the “Art in Nature Residency” program and had a studio they planned to renovate, but they did not know how to get a program like that off the ground. So, I proposed a deal, “give me a residency, and I will teach you how to have a residency.” I had been in many art residency programs over the years and knew how they function. The Garden Coordinator passed my proposal to Jaide Whitman, the President of Taft Gardens, who quickly assembled an Arts Board and approved my proposal. The Board welcomed me to Taft Gardens as their first Artist-in-Residence in January 2021.
From January to June, I worked in the garden and the newly renovated residency studio five days a week. I learned about plants from John Taft and by using a Plant Identification App on my iPhone. I became obsessed with the gardens, witnessing them change over the months. There is always new life and death in nature, and there is something new to discover daily.
People were desperately seeking safe ways to escape their homes at the time, and I craved human interaction. I started inviting friends for outdoor tours, wanting to share stories and anecdotes about the strange and beautiful botanicals I was discovering and recreating in the studio at Taft. I also figured this was a unique art opportunity. I could walk people through the property and introduce them to plants they didn’t know. By the time we got up to the studio and they saw those same plants reflected on the walls, it would feel like they were old friends, and they could engage with my work on a deeper level. It worked beautifully. I had never gotten so many people to engage in a conversation about art and the state of our environment so effortlessly and genuinely.
Over five months, I toured hundreds of people through the gardens and drummed up all kinds of interest in what I was doing. Five articles about my work appeared in various publications, and I was on the cover of several regional magazines.
My residency culminated in a successful fundraiser and an almost sold-out exhibition. Jaide Whitman and I considered the entire experience proof-of-concept, and the Art in Nature Residency at Taft Gardens was officially born.
I stayed on to help build the program as a volunteer advisor. In our second year, we hosted two artists for nine months. Four years later, we expanded with a second studio and now host seven artists each residency season from October to June. Meanwhile, Taft Gardens has remained my muse, and I continue to create work in and about the gardens. I also give “Art in Nature” tours monthly, telling stories about plants in bloom and the art that Taft inspires (my own and of all our residents).
In January of 2024, I took on an even more robust role and became the Creative Director, helping Jaide and the founder, John Taft, with foundational projects and more creative programming.
Taft Gardens is a magical place, and I am lucky to be a part of making it so special for all who find their way here. I encourage everyone to come for a visit. We are open Tuesday – Saturday for self-guided tours and offer special events from September – July. Reservations are required.
We all face challenges, but looking back, would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
I started my relationship with Taft Gardens during the pandemic, one of the most challenging times of my life. These days, I call the residency my “Covid Gift” to remind myself that something good can always come from something bad if you are willing to lean into the discomfort and take a chance.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I am a visual artist, naturalist, and storyteller living and working in Ojai, CA. I use digital photography to create collages, installations, and video works that spin narratives and present a prismatic reflection of our self-involved, technology-based, environmentally fraut contemporary lifestyles. I do this to offer a space of possibility, growth, and discovery. Within that space, I aim to create experiences that are magical and transformative.
My most recent and ongoing body of work stemmed from watching plastic production rise at an alarming rate during the pandemic. At that point, scientists were already finding nanoplastics and microfibers in all environmental matrixes, from the top of the tallest mountains to the ocean’s deepest depths. We have dusted the earth with a fine powder of these synthetic particles small enough to be absorbed into plants, animals, and humans on a molecular level. With that in mind, I employ photos of bright and colorful consumerist items traditionally used to celebrate, play, and express ourselves, and I transform these objects into flora and fauna. My compositions manifest as wallpaper installations and framed works depicting specimens from the natural world, infused with these objects as if they have become them. I constructed cactus from beach balls, protea flowers from Mardi Gras beads and slinkies, latex plants and rabbits from birthday balloons, and banksia seed pods from muppet heads and felt pennant flags.
We’d love to hear about any fond memories you have from when you were growing up.
I grew up in the 1980s in a small town in Texas, across the street from a big river with a roaring dam that turned into a creek. My sister and I built forts and campfires near the water, where we made potato soup with three sticks of butter in a cast iron pot. We had a canoe that we would drag to the river to go fishing. Whenever we saw cute boys on the bank, we would try to tip it so they would rescue us. We watched duckling chicks hatch in the springtime and the dam freeze over in the winter into a massive block of ice that looked like it was still in motion. We moved to Los Angeles when I was 12 because my sister wanted to become an actress. Ultimately, it was for the best, but I miss those days before living in the city when being a kid in nature was all I knew.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.cassandracjones.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jpegmountain
Image Credits
Marc Alt
