Mary Jones walked her audience through the artistic world of deep mapping Wednesday during her lecture, Ramble: Walking and Visual Journaling.

Jones began by discussing her love for maps and creating a multi-perspective view of the city streets she walks. Jones uses places that mean the most to her as inspiration for her maps.

Her alter ego, Harryette, and many other characters come to life in the pictures she creates.

“I live in a body but believe in the mind,” Jones said.

This is a concept she is constantly thinking about when she creates her artwork. Jones starts by picking a place that she will end up walking several times in order to collect photos, sounds, ideas, memories and all of the history around her.

Harryette, a feature in many of her pieces, is described by Jones as a self-conscious girl who always wears a black and white dress with eyes drawn all over it. The eyes on the dress symbolize not only Harryette’s seeing eyes, but also signify that others are seeing her.

“I created Harryette and it wasn’t long after that I realized I was her,” Jones said.

This is a common theme in Jones’ work. She starts with a specific plan but lets her senses take over.

“It’s really exciting to see the characters come to life,” said AJ Zandt, graduate student obtaining his master’s in fine arts.

One of the bigger pieces Jones showcased during her lecture was titled “Lincoln Avenue” and is a deep map based off of the historical street in Chicago. Jones grew up in the city and has always had ties to Lincoln Avenue.

In one instance, she described the way her aunt used to talk about riding in streetcars, tracks that have now been smoothed over. Jones said that much like the paved over tracks, so are her maps. 

“I liked hearing the stories behind the prints,” Monica Pearson, graduate student in graphic design, said. “It is cool to get the background information on why she did what she did.”

Jones went into detail about the process of creating the piece. The artwork is a combination of cartoon-like characters, writings and street maps created with multiple-layered perspectives.

“I’ve always been vexed by a horizon line,” Jones said. “In a way I am destroying linear perspectives.”

Jones recently completed a deep map of 14^th Street. The street is located in Des Moines, which is where she currently resides.

The finished piece was turned into a two-minute animation map that included Harryette, scribbled thoughts, reflections and photographs of the eight-mile strip. The sounds range from Harryette’s humming to the recreated street noises.

Although it has not been written in stone, Jones plans to create her next deep map with inspiration drawn from department stores.