'Jean Appleton’s practice has always tended to still-lifes and landscape, and since the mid-1970s at least she has been almost exclusively involved in painting interiors – works which at one level vary little in the flowers, fruits, furniture, jugs and drapery they utilise – and yet provide, as the still-life genre has traditionally done, endless possibilities for the artist to contemplate reality, experiment visually, and construct a vocabulary of creative expression.'
Reference: Simpson, Caroline Jean Appleton: a lifetime with art, Woollahra, NSW, 1998, p. 89
Described as woman of quiet intelligence, Jean Appleton belongs to a generation of Australian women artists whose dedication and determination to be acknowledged as an artist in her own right was a lengthy process, with recognition coming later in life. In 1996 she was honoured with a retrospective at the Campbelltown City Bicentennial Art Gallery, and she is represented in many major state and regional galleries throughout Australia.