Rod Harman in his obituary wrote the following about this blue painting which should perhaps remain 'untitled'.

If I was cast away on a desert Island, my ‘luxury request’ would be this painting. It has a slatted purity as wonderful as Jon’s final overcoat made by his brother Tim. As with many of Jon’s paintings it has been reworked – but this adds to the reasons I love it so much. When I first saw it, it was prophetic, like the line from Isaiah “a green shoot out of the dry earth”. So, in effect, I have two for the price of one. It now has the quality and colour of a great Chinese vase – “beauty is something that happens without interest”. It also has a raftlike quality; looking at it I can leave everything behind, escape and drift into a new world. Most of all, I won’t be alone. I can consult it.

The painting was purchased anonymously and given to Jon's mum, Linda recently - a very generous act.

The full tribute written by Jon's colleague and friend, Rod Harman is below

Jon, above all was a painter, where words are at a loss and where most of us today are at a loss. Its simply wonderful that the imperishable words of the hymns, readings and the homily written by his father so adequately rise to this occasion.

Jon was a seamless person as all spirits are. His life was a whole and his talents moved naturally from one activity to another, in other words in whatever he did he put his entire self. He was an everyday man, and it showed. He would arrive at, say, teaching with dust in his hair, calloused hands and paint–spattered clothes, dressed for work. Physically beautiful and strong, he moved and spoke in a unique way – his stance always purposeful, his hands held a few inches apart like a boy carrying a jam-jar with a stickleback in it; action and wonder combined, his thoughts were in his hands.

He was not on holiday in Cambodia but was, together with his dear friend and colleague, Tim Corrigan, shooting the final footage for a film Tim is making on conditions there. The final edit is in the offing but it will be of cinematic and ethical significance and we must provide any necessary support to bring this project to fruition.

We feel we have been robbed – but no, we were given. One of the miracles of this earth is its laws of physics – the measure of our loss is exactly equal and opposite to our gain. Only God with his grace can change this balance. A great friend of Jon’s made a profound and wry remark about the timing of his death. Jon was invariably late and this, sadly, was the only appointment for which he was ahead of schedule. Since his death, talking with dear mutual friends has raised and resurrected him and has helped me see him in light not darkness. These conversations, notably with his wife, Caroline, Tony Colley and Kate Adams among others, has made this tribute a collaborative and all–inclusive expression of gratitude. Jon would have preferred me to say, “cobbled together”, in this way he comes around the corner again; Jon, “please come around the corner again”, we don’t mind how late you are.

On top of his physical and beautifully coordinated body was an anarchic, strange, erudite and wonderful head. By chance my neighbour is a friend and fellow footballer, both played for the great club of Crowhurst. I can still hear the magical noise of their meeting on the stairs, greeting each other with high decibel joy. My neighbour told me that at half time Jon would be called upon to provide the team’s pep–talk. They could not make head nor tale of what he was saying but they returned to the pitch and played better. This is exactly Jon.

Jon was out and out a painter. Painting is a dumb language – you articulate with your hands. His life was dedicated to loosening the tongue of the hand. The philosopher Wittgenstein was fond of Goethe’s saying “In the beginning was the deed”, in other words action precedes everything. As you know Wittgenstein spent his life working on language, warning us that it could enchant and trap thought; this work was called “riverbed propositions” – our shape comes from below the surface. Jon was drawn to this bed of thinking –watching him painting; he endlessly worked the surface, adding and rubbing down, looking to find and reveal what was in and under it. His genius was to apply what he himself practised to others, teaching them at their level that the answers could be discovered inside. “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”.

He wore his erudition, degrees and prizes lightly allowing modesty to conceal his achievements. As a teacher the tasks he set students beggared belief in their challenging ingenuity. However, it was within the world of impairment that his humanity was most exposed. He realized that what the tongue and mind found difficult the hand could accomplish. That the material of paint enabled the hand to talk. However childlike, the hand draws to itself, makes a mess, scribbles. Everything is in the gesture and the mark, bound up in it and unravels. From scribbles come words, mathematics, science, philosophy and art. Fools rush in where angels fear to tread. As you know, Project Art Works was founded by Kate, Caroline and Jon to work specifically with young people with profound and multiple learning difficulties. On entering a group he would home in (in all senses of the word) to the person that was most hard to reach. That person became his benchmark for the day. This is greater than education, its visionary and takes unflinching courage and patience. It was, above all, a desire to ‘connect’. Moments like this crop up throughout our lives when fear can make us hesitate, lose faith and unable to act. But it was at these times that Jon excelled. Caroline recounted a wonderful anecdote a few days ago of a moment when, presented with this awfulness, Tim took her to one side and reminded her that Jon would never let a little bit of pain get in the way of an interesting situation. She regained decisiveness. Likewise, Jon’s lesson was that he enabled others to become decisive and live.

Jon was deep. Sadly, the world has become shallow in so many respects; love has been sidelined. This often angered Jon and provoked, in William Blake’s words, “righteous indignation”. By instinct Jon was anarchic, like Blake and many other creative spirits: likewise, he readily identified and recognised as kindred spirits the young people with disabilities among whom he worked.

Please, consider this painting. But first a small anecdote: painting is lonely, you have to ‘go further than beyond’. Those who can do this eventually climb alone and are invariably misunderstood. A father to many of us here is the painter Paul Cezanne who endured misunderstanding and ridicule throughout his life. To turn his back on this and his home town he had a studio purposefully built beyond the reach of painful words and opinions. As is their want, builders have little respect for plants and trees. A young tree was perilously close to the building works and they were damaging its tender roots. Cezanne, on seeing this, exploded, stopped the work and ordered the workmen to build a protective, retaining wall to allow the tree to flourish. In Cezanne’s remaining years the tree became one of his closest companions. In the evening after a day’s painting, he would emerge from the studio and hug his tree, and, in his words, consult it. It is not senseless to talk to trees. 

If I was cast away on a desert Island, my ‘luxury request’ would be this painting. It has a slatted purity as wonderful as Jon’s final overcoat made by his brother Tim. As with many of Jon’s paintings it has been reworked – but this adds to the reasons I love it so much. When I first saw it, it was prophetic, like the line from Isaiah “a green shoot out of the dry earth”. So, in effect, I have two for the price of one. It now has the quality and colour of a great Chinese vase – “beauty is something that happens without interest”. It also has a raftlikequality; looking at it I can leave everything behind, escape and drift into a new world. Most of all, I won’t be alone. I can consult it.

It is very difficult to adequately appreciate the complexity of Jon. Because he loved everyone, he found it difficult to single out loved ones. His love at times was raw and painful. He was intellectually sensitive and had difficulty handling his magnetic and intense personality. This is the predicament from which saints suffer.

Across the road, stands Claremont studios as a testament to the vision and dream of Caroline and Jon. Like Gaudi’s church of the Holy Family in Barcelona, it was, more or less single-handedly, repaired, renovated and maintained by Jon, and remains as a gift of generosity to us all.

On a recent visit to Jon in his studio; as he was making tea, I noticed on his vast work table, was placed a tiny, insignificant twig, coloured a beautiful grey, mottled with his beloved lichen green. Its conspicuous presence prompted me to ask why it was there – he said that he’d found it that morning on the pavement and was thinking about it. William Blake came to mind,

“To see a world in a grain of sand

And a heaven in a wild flower

Hold infinity in the palm of your hand

And eternity in an hour”.

Please, please remember that beneath the abyss of death is an abyss of love.