Monique Belitz

I am working on a novel technique, a hybrid of drawing and painting on wooden cradled boards. An under-painting of acrylic Payne’s Gray and Burnt Sienna paint creates a vibrant, rather dark ground on which to start drawing with acrylic inks. I work mostly with a metal nib and a small round brush. My colors change with the seasons; the topics often do, too, but some of them are political or personal.

Working with a pen and nib is slow work, but living the slow life is my mantra. It makes for a very meditative work approach. I am able to put in all the tiny things I observe on my daily walks, the patterns of weeds, the patterns of gravel, and the ever-changing cloud shapes above me. My dog Ellie is usually represented, sometimes our four cats, the casita where Julie lives, and the cabin up the hill. Sometimes I put in one figure, sometimes thirty. The figures are always in action, just like in the genre paintings of the 17th-century Dutch painters: Daily life with lots of details including a “moralizing” note. Although not religious, mine pertains to nature, the real hero, the entity with the most power, daily stronger due to climate change.

Homesteading puts me in close touch with the soil, cultivated, and wild foods. Working with nature, instead of against it, was implemented long before the idea of permaculture was hatched. Acequias, ponds, orchards, and gardens, all of it can be found here, built according to Native American and Hispanic precepts. These facets are actually connecting me with my childhood of spending summers in the hinterland of Austria. The same precepts, the same values of taking care of the soil, animals, and human needs. It’s old, it’s new, and it’s against consumer culture and the environment.