Belcourt's early painting has been characterized as abstract and intensely physical, with a combination of sensuality, aggression and rough, raw feeling that ran counter to the cool, conceptual art dominant in the 1990s.Bell, J. Bowyer. "Louise Belcourt," Review, April 15, 1997. Critics compare the work's dense surfaces to those of Elizabeth Murray and its gestural violence to the paintings of Joan Mitchell and Cy Twombly. Characteristic works by Belcourt in this period feature elemental, mysterious dark- or blood-red biomorphic blobs, which hover on layered, creamy surfaces suggesting flesh or earth that she distressed with scuffs, scars, punctures and stains.Volk, Gregory. "Louise Belcourt," ARTNews, September 1997. In her review of Belcourt's first solo show, New York Times critic Roberta Smith notes subtle indications of an interest in the body and landscape, pronouncing the effect of works such as My Beautiful Family (1995) as "peculiarly vulnerable" like "a painting with scraped knees."
