Statement
Jo Lathwood is a queer artist who’s practice straddles drawing, sculptural works and large installations in both galleries and the public realm. The starting point for much of these works is a response to a particular site, event, material or process.
Working with recycled timber, she has built a meandering staircase that travelled across 3 stories to facilitate the audience to touch the roof of a church. Experimenting with foundry technologies, she developed a way of casting lava into contemporary forms and though researching traditional techniques she has made inks from Oak Galls. These ideas have grown from a focus around making and an examination of our impact and relationship with the natural and built environment. Themes such as transitions, viewpoints, illusions, aspiration, environmentalism and anti-capitalism are woven throughout her practice.
Lathwood has recently recalibrated her practice to adhere to a sustainable manifesto which she wrote 5 years ago. She believe sculpture needs to shift into a new way of thinking, one that embraces borrowing, sharing, reusing and considers using materials that can biodegrade or even better be remedial in some capacity. Prioritising what happens to an artwork at the end of its life span instead of its initial creation. Creating a philosophy of ‘leave no trace’ instead of ‘making a mark’.
Lathwood is the Chair of the Board of Trustees for BRICKS Bristol. She was part of the EARTHart council at the University of Bristol (2017 - 2024). She was also the co-director of Ore and Ingot, an artist-led fine art bronze foundry in Bristol (2012-2018).
Working with recycled timber, she has built a meandering staircase that travelled across 3 stories to facilitate the audience to touch the roof of a church. Experimenting with foundry technologies, she developed a way of casting lava into contemporary forms and though researching traditional techniques she has made inks from Oak Galls. These ideas have grown from a focus around making and an examination of our impact and relationship with the natural and built environment. Themes such as transitions, viewpoints, illusions, aspiration, environmentalism and anti-capitalism are woven throughout her practice.
Lathwood has recently recalibrated her practice to adhere to a sustainable manifesto which she wrote 5 years ago. She believe sculpture needs to shift into a new way of thinking, one that embraces borrowing, sharing, reusing and considers using materials that can biodegrade or even better be remedial in some capacity. Prioritising what happens to an artwork at the end of its life span instead of its initial creation. Creating a philosophy of ‘leave no trace’ instead of ‘making a mark’.
Lathwood is the Chair of the Board of Trustees for BRICKS Bristol. She was part of the EARTHart council at the University of Bristol (2017 - 2024). She was also the co-director of Ore and Ingot, an artist-led fine art bronze foundry in Bristol (2012-2018).