Congressional Art Competition 2021

Chloe Hansen
The Statue Wears a Mask

My work was made with oil on canvas, and like most art, it can be interpreted and understood in many ways. I think that each person sees something different in the painting. They relive a part of their own experience and their own emotions. I think they may see themselves in the statue, or remember feeling like the statue. They have watched with heavy eyes as the world changes, and they remain the same. During times of challenge and uncertainty when we don’t know what to do, we just sit still and statically as the rest of the world seems to toil and move. I think it’s exhausting being a statue, feeling like you can’t do anything but sit and watch. But after it is all over, the stone has weathered the storm, and we are still here. There will always be a mask to mark this time in history, and it will also mark us, the statues, that lived through it. I don’t entirely know what my art will mean to those who see it as it’s subjective for everyone, and I think that’s what makes it beautiful.