December 2018 Unicorn Of The Month: Jacob Fossum

Artist, teacher, musician, and one of my favorite figurative painters working today. I first met Jacob when we were studio mates at the original Verge Center For The Arts location at 19th and V in Midtown Sacramento. He is a highly skilled draftsman and storyteller and when I feel frustrated with a composition I'm working on, I ask myself, " How would Jacob solve this problem?" His work deals primarily with the uniqueness of personal experience and what is lost in translation.

The journey inward is much like Terrence McKenna’s description of the psychedelic experience: “It’s like building a bonfire bigger and bigger only to discover there’s an awful lot of darkness.” As a child raised in the Mormon faith I experienced a great sense of trauma when I came into my sexuality as a gay man.

I associated that trauma with a darkness, but I have since discovered the limitless creative potential in its exploration. My work is a response to the profundity and boundless complexities inherent in darkness, and results in a series of questions without answers. It is an infinite cycle of inquiry perpetuated by my creative process.

I create multiple bodies of work that draw from Non-duality, the New Age movement, and the Mystical experience. The process of creation and close observation induces a spiritual journey of form, color, and space rooted in the Biocentric Principle, in which external and internal perceptions are inextricably intertwined and inseparable. In this realm, truth exists only as self-realization, and the individual assumes the role of Shaman, Guru, Priest, Witch or Artist.

To view more of Jacob's work, check out his Tumblr, and Instagram Account.