So, she drew horses, lots of horses and all the other critters that were around her small town home. She drew frogs and snakes from the garden, moths from the window screens on summer nights, fish from the little creek that ran through the neighbor’s wheat field and the little screech owl she found frozen one very cold winter morning. She says she has always been curious how nature works, how critters live their lives and how things are put together.
She studied at Eastern Michigan University; The School of the Art Institute Chicago; and U of I at Chicago, School of Art and Design; where she received her bachelors of studio arts. In New Orleans she has taken master classes in figure drawing with Auseklis Ozols. She taught beginning and intermediate figure drawing at the New Orleans Academy of Fine Arts starting in the fall of 1994 until the fall of 1999 when she began teaching gouache techniques and botanical illustration.
Jean began her work as an illustrator in 1970 with biology textbooks. She has over 60 titles in natural history books for young people, including Armies of Ants, Fabulous Frogs, Chameleons, Creepy Beetles, and Butterflies, all Scholastic Books for young readers; Swift as the Wind - the Cheetah, Orchard Books; Earthmates - poetry, Marshall Cavendish; Once I Knew a Spider, Walker&Co.; Lonesome George, the giant tortoise, recipient of the 2004 Giverny Award, Walker&Co.
The Mysterious Collection of Dr. David Harleyson, Walker&Co., is Jean’s first book of fiction, and the first book she has written and illustrated. It has been awarded the Golden Kite Award by the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators, for the best illustrated picture book of 2004, and was juried into the Original Art, Society of Illustrators, New York , NY.
The sequel Br'er Rabbit Captured! will be released fall of 2007.
Her illustrations for Swift as the Wind, the Cheetah, Orchard books, were included in the juried Original Art, Society of Illustrators, New York in 1997. A painting…Madame Moitessier was juried into Illustrators 40, Society of Illustrators, New York , 1998. Her work has twice been accepted in the Walter Anderson Museum of Art, Ocean Springs, Mississippi , Cross Currents, 1997 and 2000. Her work has twice been hung at the Contemporary Arts Center , “Art in the Service of Illustration” and in 1999 with Auseklis Ozols an installation of figure drawings to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the New Orleans Academy .
1994 First Invitational self-portrait show at the Academy Gallery.
1995 One person show at the Academy Gallery.
1998 “Fest for All” Baton Rouge , LA.
1999 “ Sheros” Hanson Gallery, New Orleans , LA
2000 The Glass Works, painting and glass design New Orleans , LA.
January 2001 a group show at the New Orleans Academy , with her sons Michael and John, both artists.
January 2002 Faculty show at the Academy Gallery
February 2002 “Real Women” a group show Southeastern Louisiana University
April 2003 Second Invitational self-portrait show at the Academy gallery
September 2004 Faculty show at the Academy Gallery
October 2004 “Art Works for the Earth” Duque Art Center , New Orleans , LA
March 2005 One person show at the Academy Gallery
Each year since 1991 her work is in the Academy Gallery winter group miniature show.
February 2006 Mardi Gras Show at the Academy Gallery
September 2006 Fall Faculty Show at the Academy Gallery
November 2006 Holiday Miniature Show Academy Gallery, New Orleans, LA
September 2007Fall Faculty Show at the Academy Gallery, New Orleans School of Fine Arts.
