East Meadow artist Cass Jones paints annual Long Island holiday display

I got just a little more freedom to be creative, which is very cool.”

Cassandra Jones, Artist

East Meadow artist Cassandra Jones has brought the spirit of the holidays to life once again to the Huntington Holiday Spectacular. People from all over Long Island have flocked to Huntington’s downtown to see a 75-foot-tall Christmas tree, an abundance of holiday décor — and Jones’s painted snowflakes.

The snowflakes aren’t ordinarily sized, but they are painted in a large-scale, all along the blacktop of Wall Street, the block that serves as the center of the holiday spectacular. This marks the third year in a row that Jones has coordinated the entire art display for the picturesque North Shore village, which is about a half-hour north of East Meadow.

“I will literally put art on anything,” Jones, 36, who’s also a business owner, said.

Stephen Ubertini, the co-owner of the Paramount concert hall in Huntington, first asked Jones to paint the display three years ago. Jones had displayed her work at an art gallery there.

“We became close, and they hired me the first year that they put this on because they wanted to make the street more presentable,” she said.

They eventually settled on snowflakes after toying around with a couple ideas, ranging from blacking out the road to painting snow skirts around the perimeter. 

“Snow is so generalized,” Jones explained. “It doesn’t attach itself to any particular nationality, religion, anything like that. So we put them scattered through the street so that you could take a picture, no matter where you were. You wouldn’t have to be in line for Santa — you wouldn’t have to be directly at the tree.”

Jones’s work as an artist, especially during the last few years, hasn’t been without setbacks. She has four autoimmune diseases — where the immune system mistakenly attacks healthy body cells. She receives regular weekly treatments, takes medication, and has made modifications to her diet to remain as healthy as possible.

“I’ve noticed a lot of people or patient friends of mine, who have diseases like I do, who are surprised,” she said. “And they were like, you know, ‘How are you doing this?’ Even doctors are like, ‘How is this possible?’”

She said that over the last few years she realized that she couldn’t do everything by herself. This year, she has worked alongside a team of trusty volunteers, who she called “junior snowflakes,” and Jones has received help in different ways throughout the creative process.

“I don’t think even myself, as an artist, would have thought to break things down the way I do now if I wasn’t sick,” she said.

This year, Jones also started a New York-based agency of The World Changers, a company that helps with financial education, financial strategies, business strategies, estate preservation, retirement strategies and insurance protection, among other things.

Jones’s mother, Millie, a former president of the East Meadow Chamber of Commerce and longtime banker, died after a long battle with cancer in 2019. Jones said she then became the sole executor of her mom’s estate, which was a huge challenge to take on.

“I like helping people,” she said, “so teaching artists was just a step forward from teaching people about finance and how to change their world. Now with this company, I find that not only did I learn a lot, but I got some personal growth, which affected my artwork.”

Following in her mom’s footsteps, The World Changers is part of the East Meadow Chamber. Her agency is also one of the sponsors for this year’s holiday display in Huntington.

The holiday spectacular, especially during the height of the coronavirus pandemic, was geared toward honoring first responders. Jones said that has not changed, and the main sponsor is Northwell Health.

“We like to honor our first responders,” Jones said. “But over the years, it’s now branched out, and we also like to support a whole bunch of different things.”

Each year, the holiday spectacular has unwrapped new things for visitors to enjoy.

“They have a gingerbread house that sells hot chocolate and all the goodies that you would need for the night,” Jones said. “All the restaurants on the street have outdoor seating, so that you can be part of the spectacular. There’s even seating (along the street) this year. I would say that’s a big change. I am handicap some of the time. I have blood pressure issues. Not that I am in a wheelchair all the time, but I do appreciate a place to sit down.”

And, Jones said, she’s learned a lot throughout the snowflake painting process.

“We did a little more design work this year — I got just a little more freedom to be creative, which is very cool,” she said. “We’re only allowed to use white. We’re not allowed to use color. It’s very hard to be creative with one color. It’s a hard boundary not to break, when you’re really trying to give a little bit of depth to your canvas, especially if it’s a whole road.”

The holiday spectacular officially opened on Nov. 25 and will remain lit through Jan. 1. For more information, visit LivingHuntington.com.

“There are so many people behind that scenes that are the reason that this gets put together,” Jones said. “I’m so thankful for them. I call them the elves, hardworking elves, helping put this production on to make it magical.”