Converge's 'Jane Doe' Model Revealed

As explained when we revisited the album for its 20th anniversary last month, the cover art for Converge’s Jane Doe is iconic. I’ve been seeing it on T-shirts ever since high school, long before I’d ever heard a note of the post-hardcore luminaries’ music. The artwork, a mixed media portrait of an unknown woman by vocalist Jacob Bannon, has become a central part of Converge’s iconography, functioning as a logo for the band long beyond the Jane Doe album cycle. Many people have it tattooed on their bodies. “Today, that face appears on running shorts and facemasks and coffee mugs and tote bags,” my colleague Tom Breihan wrote, “and it still feels haunting and mysterious.” As of today, it’s a little bit less mysterious.

As Brooklyn Vegan points out, a model named Audrey Marnay has identified herself as the subject of Bannon’s portrait, and Bannon has confirmed it. In an Instagram post six days ago, Marnay shared an image of herself shot by photographer Jan Welters as featured on the May 2001 cover of Italian Marie Claire, followed by images of the Jane Doe cover art, a tattoo, and various merch featuring the image. Marnay confirmed to BV that she only recently learned about the Jane Doe cover. The caption of her post reads:

Hi CONVERGE, it’s “JANE DOE”
Shall we talk!?

In a post today on Converge’s Facebook account, Bannon confirms the Marie Claire cover was one of his original sources for the album art:

Just to be clear: This is definitely one of the sources for the original stencil/mixed media piece for the “Jane Doe” album. Most of my work always been collaged cut/paste based (and still is). Hundreds of images were xeroxed and repainted/inked in a loose style to create the release artwork. This process is similar to everyone from Shepard Fairey to Francis Bacon. Over time my work has evolved into something more much more refined, but the roots will always be in this style. I wonder if folks will still insist that it is actually from the cover of Slayer’s “Reign In Blood”?

The original goal was to create ghost-like forms that embodied the concept of “Jane Doe”. In recreation identifiers are removed from physical forms, making all humans become relatable and stoic. We see what we want to see in them, and often times, it’s a reflection back onto our own life experiences, etc.

Thank you.
-J.

Check out both posts below.