Mary Virginia Langston

Mary Virginia Langston died on October 13, 2025, at the age of 79. She was a mother, a grandmother, an artist, and a kind, sensitive and curious soul. Prior to two life-altering strokes, Mary Virginia was a world traveler, an avid reader, a lover of art museums, and a dance, music and performing arts enthusiast. She had a sharp wit and the best laugh around. She was known to pull over her car to enjoy the light filtering through the trees and the movement of the clouds in the sky. Autumn was her favorite season, so it suits her that she left this earthly foundation in October. She was stronger than anyone ever knew and moved through life in her own way.

Mary Virginia was born on October 19, 1945, in Winterville, North Carolina, the only child of Cedric Donald and Mary Ida McLawhorn Langston. The strong memories from her childhood, growing up in the farmlands of Eastern North Carolina, inspired much of her artwork in later years. Although an only child, Mary Virginia was the baby of 21 first cousins on her mother’s side, raised as one great big extended family in and around Winterville, who provided her with adored surrogate siblings in her childhood and throughout her life. She could recall most of their birthdays from memory and if not, they were carefully preserved on a calendar in her kitchen. She treasured her cousins’ reunions, full of laughter and memories, BBQ, sweet tea and pimento cheese.

Mary Virginia graduated from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill in 1967 with dual degrees in history and political science and moved to Washington, D.C. to work for Congressman John Flynt, Jr. of Georgia. She also worked as a research assistant at the National Portrait Gallery. In 1971, Mary Virginia married W. Proctor Jones, and they began their life together on Capitol Hill, soon welcoming their two daughters, Heather and Lisa. Mary Virginia was an active and involved mother, always supporting her children’s interests and activities. She was a frequent volunteer in their elementary school and other organizations. She helped found the Mt. Vernon Community Children’s Theater, where she designed and made the original sets and costumes for several of the plays she produced. Being a mother was the most treasured part of her life, and she was the creator of an idyllic childhood for her daughters.

In the 1980’s, Mary Virginia followed her passion and interest in drawing and painting and enrolled in classes at the Torpedo Factory Art Center and the Corcoran School of Art, officially beginning her career as an artist. Over the next decades, she created art in all types of mediums – drawing, painting, monotype, mixed-media sculpture and installation and even cast bronze. She had fourteen one-woman exhibits in Washington, D.C., Baltimore, MD, Greenville and Raleigh, N.C. and participated in group shows across the United States, as well as in Prague, Florence, Venice, Prato, Beijing and the Gambia. She formed friendships around the world as she often opened her home to visiting artists. She was the International Exhibition Coordinator at Gallery 10, Ltd. and a member of the Foundry Gallery, both in Washington, D.C. Mary Virginia was twice awarded a resident artist fellowship at the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, as well as an artist’s residency at the Vermont Studio Center. Her work is held in the Contemporary Art Museum of Montecatini, Italy, the Greenville Museum of Art, and the National Museum of Women in the Arts, as well as in various private collections.

Mary Virginia is survived by her beloved daughters, Heather Langston Jones of Portland, Oregon, Lisa Langston Jones and her “favorite son-in-law,” Steve Radanovic, her cherished granddaughters, Lauren Langston Radanovic and Claire Proctor Radanovic, of Washington, D.C., several of her McLawhorn cousins and family, her nieces and nephews and those she considered her nieces and nephews, and her “adopted” Peruvian children Placido and Cristina. Mary Virginia was comfort and home to many.

She was preceded in death by her parents, her former husband, W. Proctor Jones, her “cousin-sister,” Carole W. Samuelson, her “cousin-brothers,” James Ernest Langston and Paul Castelloe, as well as too many other dear cousins and family to name here, and her treasured childhood horse, Captain Eddie.

Heather and Lisa are immensely grateful for her dedicated caregiver of nearly a decade, Dina Allasi, as well as everyone who helped care for her.

Should you wish to make a memorial gift in Mary Virginia’s honor, please consider:

Greenville Museum of Art, Greenville, N.C.

National Museum of Women in the Arts, Washington, D.C.

Washington National Cathedral, Washington, D.C.

Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Sweet Briar, Virginia

Memorial services will be held at later dates in Greenville, N.C. and Washington, D.C.