David Hansen

David Lynn Hansen has described the majority of his work as concerning the natural world, entropy and ‘the razor’s edge we dance upon that world as humans.’

David would use as his main paragon as that of the wars being fought and the senselessness of argumentation around the world that leave humanity ‘on the side of a cliff that is about to collapse beneath us.’

Hansen elucidates the profound beauty that we take for granted as we go about our daily lives, destroying the earth, discarding our rubbish without concern for consequences and plunging into wars for a plethora of unconscionable pettiness and greed; we are torn apart by what one might say are essentially paltry differences. Hansen’s work illuminates this: it is humans’ actions, not those of the belief in an immutable g-d, ‘who fly under the flag of the righteous and who are the zealots,’ forcing humanity’s ephemeral existence into a state that relinquishes our ability to realise our true potential as beings.

Hence, Hansen’s work illuminates and is inspired by that which might come after all is in a ruin by man or, on the contrary, man saves himself. This is not in any way a sci-fi inspiration of a ‘zombie’ apocalypse persuasion, but much more in alignment of nature taking everything back – for humans to scrap their destructive weaponry and find a way to utilise them productively instead.

In all ways as well, Hansen’s artworks are simply meant to please aesthetically. To be pretty; if one does not want to think about the atrocities that inspire him as outlined above, the aesthetics allow the narratives to just wash over the viewer. While the works include symbols about such as ladders, scaffolding, weaponry, religiosity as well as religious pattern work, all of which can seem bleak, this is mostly that which is going on in the artist’s mind. A sort of post-apocalyptic beauty. Hansen sees his works as an opportunity to present a permutation of the optimistic and the pragmatically pessimistic.

Submitted by Fein Collections