Philip Mallory Jones

“This book began life as a meld of black history and a celebration of black womanhood. It is factual, anecdotal, autobiographical. It is born of remembered snatches of my own, and anbody else’s family lore; of provocative family nick-names; of the knotted, worked out hands of my grandmother, folded so patiently in her lap. It is the fruit of a lifetime of standing back and watching the relentless energies of a race of stricken people, steadily galvanizing toward liberation. It is listening, always listening, to the cadence, the flow, the pungent getting-to-the-heart of it, that is our speech.” Dorothy Mallory jones

Dorothy Mallory Jones was educated at Northwestern University, and pursued graduate study in Clinical Psychology at Northwestern, the University of Tennessee at Memphis, TN, and Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA. She has worked as Assistant Editor at Johnson Publishing Company, Chicago; as Coordinator of Fund Raising and Development at George Williams College, Downers Grove, IL, in the public school systems of Cook County, IL, and as Psychologist in the Department of Psychological Services, Memphis, TN.

From 1975 to 1977, she created, researched and directed an independent project in oral Black History, an enterprise which required travel throughout South Georgia, and culminated in a program on Public Television, The Trouble I’ve Seen. Most recently she has worked in the Department of Continuing Education at Spelman College as a Lecturer in courses on Creative Writing, and African American Literature: A Comparative Study.

She has written in the area of, and about, black historical fiction and poetry. Her book reviews have been published in Negro History Bulletin, and her engaging adaptations of African folk tales were published in the Lore and Legend of Africa for Children.

She currently lives and works in Atlanta, GA.

“This collaboration has been germinating for three decades, and longer. It comes out of, and marks, the paths we have travelled, my mother and I, from those early days of her teaching and me learning, to mature artists who respect each other’s work. We have come full circle, in a way, able to converse through our art, with a shared language, about the lore and legends of our family, and our extended Family.

The images are derived from our family archive, the work of photographers with whom I’ve worked, and “found” photos discarded in the detritus of generational transition.

I have taken liberties with these images, associating images and text based on narrative and emotional interpretation. No commentary on the actual persons depicted is intended.”  Philip Mallory Jones

For the duration of this project, he lived and worked next door to Dorothy, in Atlanta, GA.

Lissen Here! is published in Limited Edition Portfolio, 19″x13″, 50 pages, individually printed by the artist, signed and numbered.

Lissen Here! is held in the permanent collections of the following institutions:

DePaul University, Richardson Library, Special Collections

Emory University Library, African American Collection

Brown University, Hay Library

Duke University

IUPU Herron Art Library

Lafayette College, Skillman Lbrary

Louisiana State University, Hill Library

UNC Chapel Hill, Sloane Art Library

University of Miami, Richter Library

University of Tulsa, McFarlane Library

University of Vermont, Bailye/Howe Library

Williams College, Chapin Library

Yale University Arts Library

Ohio University, Alden Library Special Collections

Ella Strong Denison Library, Scripps College

University of California, Irvine

University of California, Santa Barbara