The $\text{SL}\left( 2,\mathbb{C} \right)$-representation varieties of punctured surfaces form natural families parameterized by monodromies at the punctures. In this paper, we compute the loci where these varieties are singular for the cases of one-holed and two-holed tori and the four-holed sphere. We then compute the de Rham cohomologies of these varieties of the one-holed torus and the four-holed sphere when the varieties are smooth via the Grothendieck theorem. Furthermore, we produce the explicit Gauß-Manin connection on the natural family of the smooth $\text{SL}\left( 2,\mathbb{C} \right)$-representation varieties of the one-holed torus.

We study the germs at the origin of $G$-representation varieties and the degree 1 cohomology jump loci of fundamental groups of quasi-projective manifolds. Using the Morgan–Dupont model associated to a convenient compactification of such a manifold, we relate these germs to those of their infinitesimal counterparts, defined in terms of flat connections on those models. When the linear algebraic group $G$ is either $\text{SL}_{2}(\mathbb{C})$ or its standard Borel subgroup and the depth of the jump locus is 1, this dictionary works perfectly, allowing us to describe in this way explicit irreducible decompositions for the germs of these embedded jump loci. On the other hand, if either $G=\text{SL}_{n}(\mathbb{C})$ for some $n\geqslant 3$, or the depth is greater than 1, then certain natural inclusions of germs are strict.

In this paper we show that, in the stable case, when m≥2n−1, the cohomology ring H*(Repn(m)B) of the representation variety with Borel mold Repn(m)B and are isomorphic as algebras. Here the degree of si is 2m−3 when 1≤i<n. In the unstable cases, when m≤2n−2, we also calculate the cohomology group H*(Repn(m)B) when n=3,4 . In the most exotic case, when m=2 , Rep n (2)B is homotopy equivalent to Fn (ℂ2)×PGL n (ℂ) , where Fn (ℂ2) is the configuration space of n distinct points in ℂ2. We regard Rep n (2)B as a scheme over ℤ, and show that the Picard group Pic (Rep n (2)B) of Rep n (2)B is isomorphic to ℤ/nℤ. We give an explicit generator of the Picard group.