From the hills of Kentucky with little exposure to the outside world–I was about 8 years old when my parents took the family to visit my Aunt and uncle in Chicago. My Aunt and Uncle wisely took us to the Chicago art Museum, where I remember seeing these huge paintings. They were made up of thousands of dots. I had no idea what I was looking at nor did I know that there were persons called “Artist”; or that there was something called “painting”…I can still remember seeing those huge wonderful pictures on those giant walls…all that I knew at that moment, from naive eyes of c(u)ntry youth, was that there was something before me that I wanted to emulate / be like / figure out…something smacked my mind.

I guess you would say that those paintings changed my life. And perhaps, I can lay the blame on my aunt and uncle for exposing me to such temptation. For what that catalyzed in me was the an unwittingly absurd vow of poverty that I have since grown accustomed to affording…I chose a career that most sane institutionalized students normally chalk up as extra credit.

Of course, years later I found out that they were probably painted by Georges Seurat. Pointless pointillism still posits it’s paint Mnemonically on my Grey Matter.

Richard Haden