Jessica Nelson

Artist Statement

To Be Brave. Emotions course through me as I take the leap out into open air. Fear, excitement – such paradoxical yet compatible emotions, both paralyzing and propelling. I’m flying and falling. I want to stay up here forever, and I want to land and kiss the sweet solid earth and never do this again. I want to go forward, I yearn to go back. For a few glorious seconds, I am torn apart in a dozen different ways as my brain fires off a thousand signals telling my body about the danger and the thrill and the feeling of the wind whipping against my face and gravity rapidly reasserting its hold to bring me back down to…

Something else. Something new. Where I was and who I was no longer exists, and something new has replaced them. The next step is being okay with that, and the step after that is to take another leap.

Notes to Self. I wrote this down for me. I wanted to learn something about myself, and I did, but it wasn’t what I thought I would learn. I’m one part disappointed, one part intrigued, one part sad, one part satisfied at this small revelation of a part of myself I didn’t realize I didn’t know. I don’t think I want anyone else to see this. Well, maybe just a little bit. Maybe just parts. A word here and there, a suggestion of the whole that’s hidden underneath, not the full picture, just hints. The rest I’ll keep for me, and I know I won’t remember it all, but I’ll remember how I learned it, so that someday I can learn it again.

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