We cordially invite you to this year's PORTRAITS Hellerau satellite exhibition with the English artist Jo Bradford!
Opening: 29.08. 7pm / Salonmattinee with the artist 31.08. 11am

PROJECT STATEMENT:
I live away from civilisation in a national park in the South West of England, exploring my connection to nature, time, healing and family dynamics. At a time of profound climate anxiety, this 14-year project celebrates resilience and hope in the midst of a vast, challenging wilderness.

The photographs in this series serve as a companion to the story, expanding my view of home as I try to understand the challenges of raising children in a remote place. I embrace chaos, reconcile external realities with my inner self, and explore the unity between humanity and nature. In the process, I construct invented stories and truthful histories.

Time is a recurring motif, as is the constant evaluation of my connection to my daughter. I gave birth to her through IVF with a donated egg after several surgeries in my childhood that left me infertile. I am wrestling with time, navigating its waves and the feeling that it is passing faster and faster in its presentation. My son, who is autistic, rarely makes eye contact as our turbulent emotional experiences are documented by the mechanical eye of my camera.

I celebrate this ancient, timeless place full of history and mythology, where the cycles of life and death are clearly evident in the elemental landscape around me. I have lived here self-sufficiently for 14 years, 3 km from my nearest neighbours, trying to keep my ecological footprint as small as possible. In the harsh, intimidating landscape of Dartmoor, battered by violent storms, heavy rainfall and destructive winds, this often overwhelming life is brutal, yet this vast wilderness still charms with its dark skies and wild weather.

This ongoing project is a testament to resilience in the face of adversity, capturing the present as it becomes the past and looking to the future with an unwavering gaze and a heart full of hope.

BIOGRAPHY:

Jo Bradford was born in 1972 in Hertfordshire, England. She lives in the South West of England between her off-grid home studio in Dartmoor and Cornwall. She is a course leader for the Hons Marine and Natural History Photography programme at Falmouth University. She is represented by Galerie Miranda (Paris), Eyestorm Gallery (international) and Gina Cross Projects (London). Bradford's work has been exhibited internationally for 20 years, and in 2011 it was even shown on the International Space Station. Bradford received her Masters Degree (with Honours) in Photography: Critical Practice from Falmouth University in 2004. From 2010 to 2011 she was Artist in Residence at the Arts University Plymouth. Bradford has published four books on photography education which have been published internationally. Her books have been translated into numerous foreign languages and co-edited. Her fifth book, The Authentic Photographer, will be published by Ilex/Octopus Books (Hachette) in Spring 2026.
She is passionate about photography as a tool for creativity and mental health and has led long-term photography projects with disadvantaged young people across the UK for many years in partnership with charitable trusts and organisations such as Action for Children and the Royal Photographic Society. As director of the charity Sustainable Darkroom, Bradford has long been developing sustainable ways of working in photography, including managing darkroom chemicals via a specially planted willow woodland in her small rural garden.