JOHN TON, MURALIST

The son of an architect and the grandson of a cartoonist, John Ton was encouraged, throughout his childhood, especially by teacher-mentors, to dabble in the arts. He was that high school kid we all knew who played hooky from other classes to hang out in the art department.

John's career as a sign crafter began before graduating from high school when he produced all new signs for a medical center in his hometown. Also in his early background is experience at a local advertising agency, as an oil field roughneck in Wyoming, and as an ironworker in Kentucky. When the West Coast beckoned him home, he returned to sign crafting where the time spent working at heights and in severe weather stood him in good stead, and came in even handier for the mural commissions that were to come. Also in his sign crafting toolbox are hand lettering with a brush, large scale layouts, billboard painting, gold leafing, sandblasting, woodcarving, concrete casting, glass etching -- and his newest skill, stone masonry. Along the way, he was forced to develop his speed in order to ensure that his chosen career paid the bills.

All those tools have been helpful in the creation of John's mural portfolio. The poor quality murals we've all seen in our travels motivated John to paint his first mural in the early 90's as his initial contribution to public art. The scaling of artwork comes naturally to this journeyman sign crafter. He absorbed his design sense while working with talented designers and copywriters at the ad agency. This background enables John to use his computer more intelligently as another tool for both sign crafting and mural design.. John's aspiration for artists in mural world is for them all to be granted more freedom of content.


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