Tommy Bobo

Lives and works in Washington, D.C., USA

Artist statement

My art training benefited from starting in Kansas. Outsiders complain about the flatness, but Kansans will tell you about the importance of regularly seeing the horizon. Now over a decade removed from Kansas, I still get claustrophobic when I have gone too long without seeing all of the sky. When the sun’s light hits the atmosphere, the rays get diffused and scattered across the sky creating that pure blue sky. The light of day is not the single point of the sun, but an illuminated hemisphere that envelops us like a big blue blanket. All of this is to explain why I love working in the dark. Though my studio is small when the lights are off the space becomes near infinite. Working with light and darkness allows me to create my own horizons and blankets of color. The pieces I make are about amplifying nuance, giving light a physicality that confronts the viewer with something they may have otherwise taken for granted. Through materials that disperse and magnify, my work makes light tangible and produces an experience for the viewer that is a balance between a science fair and the transcendent.

Artwork