In the infancy of my studies and work in NYC, while massive and powerful instruction struck hard blows with its manifestos of painted space & space in paint & funerals of perspective & births of sudden muses & Piero & Puvis & the rash of Ponty, I stayed my course, erect at my Studio 44 tapping out sequences and clusters of pica imprints that would seem to dilute that religion. Words failing to really puncture fell to the surface of my yellowed onion skin leaves; words weak like me but set hard in my indifference to paint. The skin of painting that They Said
traced histories in broad minutiae
portrayed psyche and instinct as delvable passage
up and heightened or down and dulled its message in transparent strata
could resurrect the past and set the present anew
could be scraped away and held still a substantial presence
I declined the sermons of those slapping solvent-drenched beer-sot bullies. “Tap toh toh tap tap, tap tap tap” the Olivetti spoke, etching my meaningless yet non-toxic protests on their solvency.
Why would anyone wish to impose an “all-knowing” on my intrepid route through trial and understanding?
–Belle Pontus, from the Blue Journal, Belle and the Making of Her Mode