My house was uniformly, clinically, brilliant white. Well, off white actually because it obviously hadn't been decorated since it was built over 7 years ago. It may be what TV programmes recommend because it doesn't offend anyone, but it does nothing for me. I don't want to live in a dentists or doctors surgery. I want my house to say something about me. I want to enjoy being in rooms surrounded by pleasing shades of colour.
I am lucky because I discovered a very good decorator. He did the whole of the ground & first floors in 8 days. He was thorough, careful & punctual. He did precisely what it said on the tin. I'm so pleased with the result. It makes the house feel like my home. It lifts my spirits.
I think colour is fundamentally important to human beings. From the earliest civilisations human beings have used natural dyes & paints to enhance their surroundings & person. Art in general has always been of huge importance to every civilisation. Our museums & art galleries are full of artifacts from the earliest times.
With all this evidence of the centrality of art to human existance it is a shame that for years art has been relegated to second place in education. Children benefit enormously from being allowed to explore their creativity and experience good teaching. Education is for life & is lifelong. We need to encourage children to value the arts generally. We are better people if we are balanced & fully rounded people.
Art feeds the spirit. I went to the Ashmolean Cezanne exhibition last week. It was wonderful, particularly the first room. Cezannes watercolours were a revelation. His overlapping watercolours & deliberately unfinished areas were superb. Less is definitely more, so subtle & so clever.
I'm about to hang the first picture that I have actually comissioned. I love it. It reminds me powerfully, in a positive way, of many walks I have done with Dave in the English countryside. The light & colour is superb.
We need more than maths, language & science in the curriculum and in our lives. We need to experience & value creativity.
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