Jo Topholm

To understand is to question. Question all that should be explored. In life there are things that separate and things that connect us.  As I began art I drew mostly from my mathematical influences to help define my work and as I began to see myself as an artist I started exploring other possibilities for my art. This exploration has taken me down a path of discovering who I am as a person and an artist. In my most current body of work I am dealing with self-portrait images which for me serve as a vehicle for understanding things that create a separation in life between people.

In this exploration the images became less about the photograph but more about how I became the viewer of myself. As I began to look at these images they appeared to be an abstract representation for parts of my own life. There became this sense of wonder and mystery about the images. They began to create a story, a story of struggle, of understanding the ways my own life has been divided. Questions with infinite solutions began to reference the surface of the images themselves and became a way to define those questions.

The textured surface within the images gives the sense there is something to be touched but is just a little out of reach. With eyes closed beyond this water like surface as if to be drowning in life’s decisions looking for a way out and realizing that hiding beyond the walls of life can’t go on forever. Looking beyond the wall with eyes open searching for the moment to shatter the disconnection caused by those walls in life. A search to bring worlds together.

Self Portrait pigment print on paper 20″ x 27″

Self Portrait pigment print on paper 20″ x 27″

Self Portrait pigment print on paper 20″ x 27″