Betsy Damon "The 7000 year old woman"

‘The 7000 year old woman. Who is she? Let me tell you the little I know about her. She is my sister, mother, grandmother, friend and lover. She has been the origin of my womanhood for the last 7,000 years and she is me, the ‘I’ about which I know very little. She found me in Los Angeles in the spring of 1975. I imagined myself as being covered with bags of flour. During the next two years, I continued seeing this image, but with one change. She turned into a clown, and i decided to paint my body and my face white. It was not until after the first Sacred Grove (performance in Cayman Gallery, New York, 1977) that I discovered the identity of a 7,000 year old woman. Because I grew more and more in awe of her and did not know much about her, the first step in depicting her was to give her a name. I have come to understand that I clarify her effigy. I have some skill and discipline, but she has enchantments of her own. I get to know her through the performances; this means I learn to exist through her.’ (Betsy Damon, Heresies, nr. 3, 1977, pp. 10-13.)