In 1993 I completed a three foot by five foot collage on the life of Jacob. If you looked at the painting from left to right it chronologically depicted scenes from the life of Jacob. If you looked at it from right to left, it spelled the word Israel in Hebrew. I speak of the painting in the past tense because it no longer exists. After twenty two years of life on our wall and countless conversations about the artwork with friends, I decided this summer to redo it. The painting was fading because of sunlight. It overpowered our sun-room where it hung. And in its former format, it didn’t have a future with the members of our family.

So I took the collage apart, stuck it in a shoe box, and thought about it. The life of Jacob is the story of hands. The first picture that you see of Jacob is his hands grabbing his brother’s heal as he emerged from the womb. That is how he got his name—heal grabber. The last picture in his life was on his deathbed, hands crossed, blessing his two grandsons. It took 147 years to go from grabbing to blessing. The critical transition point in his life was a wrestling match with God in Genesis 32. Jacob let go of all he had acquired in the first half of his life and grabbed onto God.

I decided to create three new paintings from the remnants of the old painting. They are titled:hand grabbing, hands wrestling with the angel and hand blessing.

Jacob artwork is mixed media on mat board,

16×20, 2015, © Steven Stuckey

Poetry

Jacob and the Wrestling Match

It was a contest like no other and the first lines of the poem are:

The Holy Hulk of Heavenly Heights heaved his huge frame to the ring.
He bellowed in voice that billowed the clouds, “Jacob, I am the King!”
King of All Wrestlers, that is my name; your chosen to challenge the champ.
The match is at midnight, we fight till the dawn, the light of the moon is our lamp.”

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