Jackson’s early interest and formal training in photography led to an MFA from the University of Colorado at Boulder. He works in traditional darkroom techniques as well as digital, and his interest in the underlying history, physics, and theory of photography, optics and visual perceptions have led him into experimental installations with optics.

His photographic works engage with subject matter such as landscape, still-life, and constructed tabletop worlds, all with an emphasis on the imagination and the rich and oblique narratives implied by the microcosm within the photographic frame. Themes include curious and disorienting perspective, representation and re-presentation within the photograph, connections between contemporary imagery and the history of graphic art and painting, and the landscape as simultaneously real and imaginary.

In all cases, the magical translation of a real world’s visual reality into a flat, graphic, arresting image creates a space of exploration and invention. Meanings are open-ended, possibilities are offered up, and the personal imaginative concoction is laid out on the two-dimensional surface.

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