Wyoming Artist Chases Freedom In A Van With Girlfriend, A Drifter & Welding Equipment

Lander native Jake Kauffman may be the chillest dude in Wyoming. At 22, he is packing his life into a battered 1987 Volkswagen van with his girlfriend Pheadra and chasing freedom across the American West. If he has become an eclectic artist with a mellow take on life, it is because of a less-than-chill upbringing.

At 14, Kauffman flatlined after drowning in Lucky Pond. He describes surviving a traumatic brain injury, followed by substance abuse and escalating trouble. He was sent away to a boys ranch. After his release, he overdosed on prescription pills. “Since that overdose, I realized that I needed to do something different with my life,” he said. “I needed to find what my purpose is.”

That pursuit became obsessive. He began posting daily affirmations online—short fragments of philosophy meant for people trapped in the same emotional loops he once was. At 18, he briefly attempted conventional adulthood in Powell, renting a house for $1,200 a month while working 12-hour days for $10 an hour. He decided that was “no way to live.” He didn’t have time to play guitar or do things that made him happy. “This is killing my actual soul,” he remembered thinking. So he burned the whole idea down.

Kauffman’s art brand is called DHC: Death Honors Consciousness. “The death of myself when I drowned, or when I overdosed, or when I realized that I have to die to myself to create a new person—that honored my consciousness,” he said. He speaks about death not as evil, but as necessary transition. “Death is really just change.”

That philosophy runs through everything he builds. Before leaving town, he needed to find a home for a towering scrap-metal sculpture called “Anubis,” the Egyptian god that guides souls to the underworld. Built from discarded trailer jacks, oil drums, and salvaged steel, the rusted warrior found a home with a woman grieving her late husband. She told him the piece reminded her of a protector watching over her daughters. “What was trying to let darkness out of my soul became something somebody else saw as protection,” Kauffman said, marveling at the reversal.

The van, which he bought for $2,500 and has since invested roughly $25,000 into rebuilding, is basically “a really big backpack.” It carries welding equipment, three sewing machines, musical instruments, tools, clothing designs, a coffee maker, survival gear, art supplies, and every half-finished idea Kauffman thinks might someday turn into a paycheck or purpose. He describes wandering the country almost like improvisational jazz: no hard destinations, no five-year plan, just movement, intuition, and adaptation.

Kauffman met Pheadra the way people in nomadic subcultures often meet: by coincidence and with intensity. She was living in an Astro van in Bend, Oregon. Eventually she upgraded to a converted mini school bus, and Kauffman returned to Wyoming with her to help turn it into something livable. Now they are preparing to head back onto the road together.

Kauffman insists he will return to Wyoming eventually. For now, the road still feels right. “Humans are inherently designed to be creative,” he said. “If you want to figure out a way to live the life you want, it’s up to you to be creative to make that happen.” So he keeps moving west in a rattling Volkswagen packed with heavy machinery and ghosts of several previous versions of himself, chasing art festivals and strange encounters across the desert.