Monochrome or Kodachrome

~

We live in a small house on the river. We built this house about 24 years ago but only lived in it for three years before building a larger family home next door. It was in the big house that we raised our family of four children, a cat and a dog.

A number of years ago we bought the little house back and moved in while we renovated the big house ready for sale. Our plan was to demolish the little house and rebuild a contemporary architectural statement.

But things changed in the intervening period. For starters our nest emptied almost completely.
But more importantly we began to love this little house.

From the street it is a small unassuming cottage but once in the front door your vision flows right through the glass elements of the house to the green of the river and the trees on the bank beyond. When the house was originally built the extensive use of glass and the open plan design were quite radical concepts.

So we tidied it up and stayed put. Surrounded as we are now by contemporary architectural homes, the odd Mc Mansion and mausoleum, edifices to questionable taste and aesthetic merit, our little river house sits quietly on the river's edge and is an abode of peace and serenity.



If you had asked me about the interior of the house I would have told you it was monochromatic - white walls, a white painted timber high raked ceiling and blond timber flooring. The light floods through the house by way of the exterior shade structures creating ever changing patterns on the white surfaces. The white colour scheme enhances the light airiness and creates a feeling of spaciousness.

But when I wandered around the house the other day with my camera as my third eye I noticed something surprising. The house has erupted in colour just as the Australian outback, after the rains, bursts into a riot of wild flowers the colours of an artist's smeared palette. Everywhere I pointed the camera I found splashes of colour like a Margaret Olley still life.

If you come with me I'll tell you about a few of these corners that are not self explanatory.

When I think back
On all the crap I learned in high school
It's a wonder
I can think at all
And though my lack of edu---cation
Hasn't hurt me none
I can read the writing on the wall

Kodachrome
They give us those nice bright colors
They give us the greens of summers
Makes you think all the world's a sunny day, Oh yeah
I got a Nikon camera
I love to take a photograph
So mama don't take my Kodachrome away

This shot is the corner of a painting done by Ari Vanderschoot, I was going to tell you the story behind this painting but Ari deserves a blog to herself so I will put her aside and add her to my to do blog list.

If you took all the girls I knew
When I was single
And brought them all together for one night
I know they'd never match
my sweet imagination
everything looks WORSE in black and white

I found this patchwork throw in Kauai, Hawaii.

Kodachrome
They give us those nice bright colors
They give us the greens of summers
Makes you think all the world's a sunny day, Oh yeah
I got a Nikon camera
I love to take a photograph
So mama don't take my Kodachrome away

Mama don't take my Kodachrome away
Mama don't take my Kodachrome away
Mama don't take my Kodachrome away

A section of his collection of Hawaiian Aloha shirts.

Another corner of Ari's painting

Mama don't take my Kodachrome
Mama don't take my Kodachrome
Mama don't take my Kodachrome away


Mama don't take my Kodachrome
Leave your boy so far from home
Mama don't take my Kodachrome away
Mama don't take my Kodachrome


Mama don't take my Kodachrome away

One of my daughters made the little koala, sitting on this shelf, at kindergarten when she was about 3 years old.

One of my many journals, collections and List books.

Kodachrome
They give us those nice bright colors
They give us the greens of summers
Makes you think all the world's a sunny day, oh yeah
I got a Nikon camera
I love to take a photograph
So mama don't take my Kodachrome away

So I suppose that you could more accurately say that my house is a white canvas strewn with tropical colours.
We know that colour can effect our moods and alter our emotions. We use colour to describe feelings, mind-frames and physiological states. We say things like: in a blue funk; I saw red; his face turned yellow, she turned white as a ghost.

I have always thought of myself as a blue person but I've noticed lately that I have become more of a green person. I'm attracted to the colour of green - I like the feeling that it generates in me, I don't wear it often but I think green and feel green. I have green moods and a green outlook. And even though I am slowly but surely moving into the autumn of my life I am feeling, deep down inside, a very green growing, evolving, natural and earthy, alive, connected to the land, the trees and plants, and shooting fresh young buds sort of a green -
I feel full of hope and awe and life.


What colour are you?





Kodachrome is performed by Paul Simon and appears on the album There Goes Rhymin' Simon (1973)