Jacob Hokanson, painter

'Welcome Shadows', Oil on Panel, 24" x 30"

Jacob Hokanson added artwork to FineArtAmerica.com

This piece is my neo-pagan take on the Green Man myth of personal transformation and represents for me the combination of removal of layers of misinformation with the eruption of root understandings of life and existence within it. It speaks of doors that once opened can never be closed again. It is both terrifying and wondrous.

Creating art is such a complicated and messy thing. For me there is no more vulnerable endeavour than to dig around in the chaotic soup of my internal world and then try to interpret it with form and colour in an external way. In doing this I allow the viewer to judge my process and ultimately me. There is a power exchange that occurs in this and a tendency I must fight is to withhold what is actually going on for me out of fear of whether the viewer can 'handle' it or not. O...r to withhold what is actually going on because I judge it might create discomfort in the viewer or, ultimately, to withhold what is actually going on for me because I judge that the viewer may not wish to know what is actually happening, regardless of which feeling might be occurring. I look around me and see a constant fight to uphold the image of a generic, safe, white-washed variation of life and I just don't want to add to it anymore. I'm broken, but that doesn't mean you need to fix me, or even that I need fixing. There is beauty, honesty and vulnerability in the shattered pieces that make up my internal world. It's what I have to share and it's uniquely me. See more