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Rene Ricard was known to destroy his own art — here, as in many of his works, he speaks obliquely about his own self-destructive excesses. Dangerous Liaisons includes another recurrent Ricard motif: the shapes of two inked and printed lithography stones as the poems’ frames, suggesting the symbiotic expressiveness of poetry and visual art. Here the heavy limestone slabs used to print lithographs function as literal and figurative frames for Ricard’s urgent cursive and emotionally-charged poetry.
“It is inconceivable that a Group of people Would conspire to plot the Destruction Of an individual. Who Would Want to Harm one? / In the House of Lords alone, I can count up to…Not even a memory,…One Could become not even a memory, Say a consortium of enemies / Posing as collectors Bought up an Artist’s entire output…A match, a Flash and good Bye posterity.”
A photograph of the lithography stones from which Dangerous Liaisons was printed is published with an accompanying poem in Ricard’s 1990 book of poetry Trusty Sarcophagus, published by Inanout Press and printed in Italy. (pp 54-55)
