Finding brown was not difficult. It’s in almost every painting or rendered piece; it’s simply unremarkable in most instances. My task was to find the pieces that were most evocative or revelatory. More often than not, brown is used as an anchor—as a means of grounding images and emotions. It is there to give other colours a foundation. Less severe than black, it can serve to round out a scene or temper ostentatious displays of luxury.
It works to convey despair, modesty, wealth, and poverty. It is rare to find it leveraged for its own merit. Brown is ubiquitous because it has few if any clichéd connotations. Sure, it’s the colour of chocolate, of coffee, and cherry wood, but it hasn’t become symbolic of any one message or idea.
Brown is the baseline in a song—unnoticed because of the melody, but absolutely crucial to the architecture of the piece.
Brown builds, adheres, and warms.
I followed it all over the museum, in and out of rooms—finding the suggestion of it even where it wasn’t. In the deep spaces of burgundy and the dun center of amber.
Whenever there was a pairing of brown with another colour, more often than not, it was blue. The match is an intuitive one, it seems. The more I see them together, the more it seems to me that one begs the presence of the other.Finding brown out on the street was not as easy. There is more brown now than ever before (it’s in vogue, especially when paired with robin’s egg blue and other, warmer blues), but just walking on the street, it was largely unsung—until I ran smack dab into it.
It works to convey despair, modesty, wealth, and poverty. It is rare to find it leveraged for its own merit. Brown is ubiquitous because it has few if any clichéd connotations. Sure, it’s the colour of chocolate, of coffee, and cherry wood, but it hasn’t become symbolic of any one message or idea.
Brown is the baseline in a song—unnoticed because of the melody, but absolutely crucial to the architecture of the piece.
Brown builds, adheres, and warms.
I followed it all over the museum, in and out of rooms—finding the suggestion of it even where it wasn’t. In the deep spaces of burgundy and the dun center of amber.
Whenever there was a pairing of brown with another colour, more often than not, it was blue. The match is an intuitive one, it seems. The more I see them together, the more it seems to me that one begs the presence of the other.Finding brown out on the street was not as easy. There is more brown now than ever before (it’s in vogue, especially when paired with robin’s egg blue and other, warmer blues), but just walking on the street, it was largely unsung—until I ran smack dab into it.
I was open to brown; I really wanted to find it wherever I could. However wan the instance, I was willing to accept it, and then I found such a kinesthetic example. I almost rejected it because I didn’t want to bother the workman, but I thought better of such foolish propriety. The spirit of the humanifesto subpoint “keep on moving,” served me well. I didn’t linger too long with any one instance of brown. I expected it to reveal itself more, but I didn’t feel that old prohibitive insistence.
I was working soft, not hard. I kept thinking of art first. When the colour assignment was given, I didn’t fight the pull toward brown, even though I worried that I might get more mileage from another colour.
It was all around me.
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