Using play as a vehicle to subvert the myth of presence and certainty, Jacob exaggerates language’s capacity to rewrite the stories we tell about ourselves and the world, too. The artist’s critique of places like Disneyland, the so-called “happiest place on earth,” speaks to the American ideal of success, empire, and national identity… Echoing the themes of transcendence in the works of Thoreau and Emerson, Walt’s Play engages with the idea that paradise may not be an external place at all, but an internal state, a process of self-discovery that allows us to live meaningfully in the world with others.

— Andrew Gardner, Writer & Curator