Bifidus Jones
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BIO
Bifidus Jones is a collage artist and painter born and based in Minnesota. They began their art career in 2010 as a member of IUOMA, the International Union of Mail Artists. In addition to participating in mail art exhibits around the world, they have produced five original books through the support of the Brooklyn Art Library including A Record Year for Rainfall: The Private Life of Alphons Trio (2011), and But the View Is So Lovely (2021). Recent exhibits include the Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank’s Friends, Families, and Communities exhibit, Art Reach St. Croix’s Mobile Art Gallery, and the Postal Collage Project No.15 show at the Berkeley Art Center in California.
Little About Bifidus
What’s something people don’t know about you, or would be surprised to learn about you?
We were born on the same day that the Apollo I astronauts perished in their space capsule. We’d like to think we passed in the hall.
What song/album/artist is currently on repeat in your studio?
The album Enigma Variations by Edward Elgar.
When is your favorite time to create?
Between 6am and 3pm.
What is your guilty pleasure tv show or movie?
The series, My Brilliant Friend.
What is an unusual skill you have outside of art?
Japanese sword-fighting.
If you weren’t an artist, what would you love to be doing?
Playing the French horn in the BBC Symphony Orchestra.
What’s your biggest artistic obsession right now?
The Bayeux Tapestry.
What’s the most unexpected thing you’ve used in an artwork?
Cheese. Yeah, no. We’re not elaborating on that.
What was your first creative memory, or a specific artistic moment that made you realize,“I really want to do this?”
Drawing all over our bedroom walls—age 4.
Where were you born and where did you grow up?
We were born and raised in San Francisco, Minnesota, a ghost town originally founded by a surviving member of the Donner Party.
Who are your artistic influences or mentors?
Louise Nevelson, Hannah Höch, Magritte, Romare Bearden, Chagall, Ray Johnson, Fornasetti, Leonora Carrington, Joseph Cornell, Kusama, Hundertwasser, Botticelli, Kirchner, Josh Dorman, Emma Amos, Frank Big Bear, Frida Kahlo, James Ensor, Audubon, Eduardo Paolozzi, Cindy Sherman, and Peggy Guggenheim for her unconditional love of art.
If your art had a personality, how would you describe it?
Well-traveled storyteller. Playfully intellectual. Holy explorer. Wry and theatrical. A bit unfathomable. One third archivist, one third surrealist poet, and one third stand-up philosopher.
How would you describe your style to someone unfamiliar with your work?
From a distance, you first notice striking figures, zoological, and cosmic elements painted on canvas with bold, architectural acrylic sweeps. As you step closer, you discover the canvas bedrock actually consists of painted typographical and cartographical fragments. The raw-looking seams of these fragments, bound by luminous pigments, invite you to intimately read the artworks as living archives. Traditional collage techniques blend with the fluidity and permanence of large-scale, contemporary paintings.
What color do you use most, and why?
Cadmium Yellow. We consider it to be the luminous thread of reincarnation. It is the color of the sun and eternal return. It is Divine Spark. Cadmium Yellow is a way of illuminating the endless consciousness that persists across lifetimes, ensuring those past lives are flooded with light rather than lost to the shadows of history. It is Big Bang. Cadmium Yellow provides contrast. It operates as sacred play—a joyful, energetic disruption. It symbolizes the pursuit of beauty and grace. There is an inherent warmth to Cadmium Yellow that elevates whatever it touches. It transforms ordinary, forgotten fragments into objects of enlightenment. It reminds viewers that all life is Divine.