alla prima oil "Roses Pales dans le Bol d'or" It occurred to me today as, on my hands and knees, I washed the squashed blueberries off the kitchen floor, that housework is only noticeable in its absence; had he visited here, Hamlet would have said "more honoured in the breach than in the observance." My Beloved can live in perfect harmony with a pile of clothes on the chair, the detritus of a fly-tying marathon on the hardwood in his study, and every species of footwear scattered (sometimes in pairs) throughout the three floors. His version of "unbearable mess" would be more likely constituted by a calculus lesson which is imperfectly clear. However, as one who is plagued by mostly visual disturbances, I have not reached that state of nirvana where they don't bother me, despite my best efforts to ignore them and paint. Housework is the hag that rides me.
This would be fine if I were wed to Spartan simplicity. I read about one woman, an engineer, who decades ago constructed her entire household to be washable: a flick of the switch and the house transformed into what must have been an early version of an automatic carwash. Even granting that one could handle the issue of where to be during a wintertime wash cycle, I think this approach still unlikely in the average home. Slippery, for one thing. And even as one who likes stainless steel, I can't imagine a home populated by cool metal, without a range of colours and textures. Most of us hyper-visuals (aka artists) particularly love the change of seasons. Right now the coming of winter is making me crave the warmth of glowing surfaces, hand-woven rugs, and the fireplace alight. These seasonal adjustments will arrive slowly, as I fit my mind around the end of autumn. Stuff will go away and different stuff will emerge. All will need dusting.
Even the paintings which conjure warm spaces will re-emerge. After all, one can't spend one's entire life under a bed.
This would be fine if I were wed to Spartan simplicity. I read about one woman, an engineer, who decades ago constructed her entire household to be washable: a flick of the switch and the house transformed into what must have been an early version of an automatic carwash. Even granting that one could handle the issue of where to be during a wintertime wash cycle, I think this approach still unlikely in the average home. Slippery, for one thing. And even as one who likes stainless steel, I can't imagine a home populated by cool metal, without a range of colours and textures. Most of us hyper-visuals (aka artists) particularly love the change of seasons. Right now the coming of winter is making me crave the warmth of glowing surfaces, hand-woven rugs, and the fireplace alight. These seasonal adjustments will arrive slowly, as I fit my mind around the end of autumn. Stuff will go away and different stuff will emerge. All will need dusting.
Even the paintings which conjure warm spaces will re-emerge. After all, one can't spend one's entire life under a bed.
RSS Feed
