Martha Davis King was a student for the summer of 1956.

Her application shares that she worked as a model in life drawing classes in exchange for lessons (summers of 1952 and 1954). She also shared that one reason her grades may be poor on transcripts was "rebellion of the stupidity of teachers and subjects."

Martha shared a memoir, "Three Months in 1955: A Memoir of Black Mountain College" with Jacket Magazine in 2010. In 2018, Martha published a memoir of her life with Basil King titled OUTSIDE/INSIDE...just outside the art world’s inside by Martha King.

After Black Mountain, Martha moved west, eventually landing in San Francisco in 1957, where she reconnected with Black Mountain poets John Wieners and Joe Dunn at a City Lights Books reading. It was at this reading that she met artist and fellow BMC alum Basil King, who became her lifelong partner.

In 1959, the couple moved to New York City and joined the dynamic social circle of poets, artists, and bohemians who congregated at the Cedar Street Tavern, a group that including Allen Ginsberg, Paul Blackburn, Frank O’Hara, LeRoi Jones, Diane di Prima, and Dan Rice. King worked a series of office jobs, including for an advertising company, a knitting company, and Random House.

The couple had two daughters, Mallory and Hetty, while King earned a reputation within the community as a typist, transcribing speeches by Malcolm X, journals by Hubert Huncke, and manuscripts by points with means. After a decade in Manhattan, the Kings permanently moved to Brooklyn in 1969.

The two artists reside in New York and continue to share stories of Black Mountain College on their websites - marthawking.com and blog.basilking.net

Martha has a collection "The Martha King Collection" at the University of Buffalo.

Relationships

Husband: Fellow BMC student, Basil King

Black Mountain College Project

Mary Emma Harris interviewed Basil and Martha in 1997 and the transcript is available from Appalachian State University under The Mary Emma Harris and Black Mountain College Project, Inc. Oral History collection.

Topics: M King introduction to BMC through Black Mountain Review, application for 1955 summer session, and objections of father, director of UNC Press – M King typing course and move to San Francisco – meeting of King and Davis in San Francisco – B King studies at BMC – b King automobile accident at BMC – B King description of Charles Olson – B King childhood in England and war influence – B King immigration to United States – B and M King on jazz – introduction to Abstract Expressionism in Detroit – introduction to Franz Kline and Willem de Kooning in New York – Joseph Fiore as art teacher – Charles Olson’s classes – study with Esteban Vicente at BMC – family objections to marriage – B King’s career as artist – socialism as realistic system or not – purchase of Brooklyn house – M King family background – John Allcott at UNC Chapel Hill art department – students from Cass Tech at BMC – Wes Huss theater productions – M King on John Stix as teacher in New York – final years at college – 1955 summer – Tom Field automobile accident at Lake Eden – Peek’s Tavern

Courses Taken

Summer 1955: Weaving (Landreau),Theatre (Huss), Lithography (Fiore), Painting (Fiore)