Graffiti artist and painter, John Andrew Perello aka Jonone, is from dominica origins, and born in New York City in the sixties. Early on he chose his nickname JonOne, simply adding One to his first name. As a kid from the Spanish Harlem neighbourhood, he learns painting in an original way, by bombing trains and walls in the city. Everything he knows he learned by himself, and moves pretty early and naturally from the urban environment to the canvas. His paintings have been shown all around the world and are clearly influenced by his lile : the street, hip hop, the subway and modern painting. JonOne’s style is quite innovative in graffiti. He is immediately famous for going out of the box, and not follow the graffiti codes by doing abstract pieces in the streets and on trains. His pieces are more freestyle than one could expect from a graffiti artist. But for JonOne everything is about freedom, there are no limits. As he recalls “I feel in a way in painting what attracted me was freedom.” As far as he remembers he liked painting. And he has been at first influenced by graffiti godfathers as Phase 2, Noc 167 and Zephyr. “ What made me realize what I was doing was special is one day I remember a time I was in a tunnel I saw youngsters talking about color blends and palettes and I was like chekc this out they’re talking like artists. And to me, at that moment, this justified what I was doing. I had at the time to convince myself what I was doing was right. Everybody back then would be like find a real job, it’s a crime you can end up in jail.” He joins the 156 All Starz, a crew of young kids from Broadway and 156th street. And if him going to canvas might be the result of the string repression against graffiti, JonOne recalls that even as a kid he already wanted his art to last longer than it does in the streets. Raised in New York City he has always been surrounded by this creative energy one can still see in his paintings. “When you walk around, you see the names everywhere. Instead of reading newspapers like everybody else, I’d read graffiti on the streets every morning. I was curious about who was responsible and wanted to do it myself‘.” As a kid of Dominican origins there is also a specificity about his work, something in the details that links him to a deep cultural background and a taste for details. Today JonOne lives his life with one burning desire - to paint.
Sine the 1970’s JonOne has been a key figure in a progressive movement of street art. Along with his contemporaries such as A-One and Samo (aka Jean-Michel Basquiat) he has been instrumental in developing and establishing graffiti art as a legitimate and collectable art form. What sets JonOne apart from other graffiti artists is his focus on the excitement and movement of color as opposed to the typical associations of character drawings and graphic insignias. Evolving from his early days tagging the streets of New York his style now goes beyond the traditional codes of graffiti and finds its roots in American abstract expressionism. On the trains alrdeay his style was amazing for its abstract flavour. Today one can say his painting is about freedom, as if Jacskon Pollock met Ornette Coleman, the inventor of free jazz. JonOne composes his painting with colors, as Ornette Coleman composes his music with sounds, both reaching an abstract powerful yet harmonious, multilayered result. With references to American abstract expressionist Jackson Pollock and French painter and sculptor Jean Dubuffet, JonOne’s artwork has evolved stylistically from his spray-painted, elaborate patterns of intense colours in the early 90s to his more recent bold shapes and lines in black and white brushstrokes. In other series he has used tags as a calligraphy repetitive and automatic movement. Yet in all his painting JonOne gets into a lot of details. JonOne is adding up layers and details in what could be a never ending, full of energy, painting. It is after moving in to Paris, in 1987, that his career as an artist really started. In his paintings space is fully occupied, there is not an empty space left. Colours are like blood running through his veins. JonOne is a master at adding up an enormous amount of colours without ever making it too much. It always stay a subtle melody. Forms intertwine, shapes melts into something unexpected and colours blend into each other. His shapes are at the same time symmetrical and asymmetrical. The line is very precise yet flows rapidly. Each painting is improvised and bursts with a certain joie de vivre. Magda Danysz