At 5 a.m., the full, setting moon streams into the dark living room. It feels like an inverted sunset, the long rays of light a colorless white instead of warm gold, casting inky black shadows across a charcoal backdrop. It has its own beauty, I suppose. Stark lines, flattened landscape, high contrast. Cool. Dramatic yet removed. To place a hand in the moonlight is to see it illuminated with an unforgiving harshness. Colorless.
The same scene, but 6:00 p.m. The same angle of light cast across the same living room, this time the sun throwing its golden rays across the soft-edged chair, pulling into focus the multicolored spines of books on a low shelf. Everything in the room wears a slightly fuzzy halo of richness, with every color singing out its full depth. The patch of afternoon sunshine draws one into it like a contented old spaniel, stretching to feel its healing warmth on every inch. Color.
When I consider these two visual scenarios, as I have this week, color wins. Every time. Color is wild and disruptive but also deep, inviting us to linger on it as it changes in response to shifting light. It defies definitive explanation; there are too many words one can use to describe each individual color picked out by a single ray of sun. There is a famous poem and I cannot for the life of me call its title or author to mind, but it works its way through the many descriptive words that try to capture an exact shade of red. That is true of every single color, if given attention long enough.
We currently live in a world where words like “neutral” and “muted” set expectations. The great They of the digital world tell us that monochromatic means high end, sophisticated. Status. Taste. Aesthetic. And They are more than happy to tell us exactly what that means, what it requires, where we can buy it so that we, too, can look like Them. Which is to say, Same.
I think people gravitate toward this for two different reasons. They either want someone to tell them how to be all of those things – sophisticated, high class – and simply follow the rules in hopes of arriving there externally and therefore, belonging. Or, they find life bewildering and need their surroundings to be as visually and emotionally unchallenging as possible.
I understand the latter. Life is quite chaotic as a general rule, in a world where the only constant is change (these sayings exist for a reason). As a personal preference, I get it. It is the former against which I must push back. This trend (bordering on societal requirement) has gnawed at me for some time and I only just realized why. I am a lifelong reader; I could not even guess at how many books I have read thus far. They have created a Light Bright image in my mind, with every book leaving at least one tiny bulb in the formation of a beautiful picture of life as I see it. Recently, when contemplating some comments someone made about the colors in my home, it came to me with startling suddenness: The Giver, by Lois Lowry. The ownership of color by power, and the wielding of that power for control of people through Sameness. This theme, or variations of it, has been explored or alluded to in many other pieces of art, but for me, this book so clearly represents my feelings about color and its symbolism for depth and breadth of life when we have individuality and autonomy of choice.
Color invites, no, requires an emotional response. What a beautiful and accessible tool to create the world one needs in which to know oneself. It doesn’t mean primary shades or neon brightness; color can be gentle, but it is never shallow. It might sound dramatic, but the pressure of the monochromatic life means giving up the agency of preference in pursuit of approval. A colorful life, even in the trappings of the home surroundings, is the best form of rebellion. It gives us space and freedom to decide who we are, as we are, and visually live that out.
For me, color wins. Every time.
