Colour Lesson from a Cargo Barge

Just a single photo this morning.  But I find this view from my front deck so effective (you’ll appreciate it better if you have a moment to click and enlarge). The cargo ship is so homely, so obviously work-oriented, industrial, yet it fascinates as it swivels with the tides and the winds, continually offering me a different configuration of its steel towers. And the colour story. . . so much can be done with greys, and the restrained palette draws the eye inexorably toward the punctuating red and orange. A lesson, to be sure . . . (and, in fact, a lesson I also observed recently in William Trevor’s Love and Summer, which I posted about here)

6 Comments

  1. Susan Tiner
    7 June 2011 / 8:31 pm

    I love it when color punctuates like that.

  2. Patricia
    7 June 2011 / 11:18 pm

    Inspiration for my new dining room – that steel blue paint on the walls and a bright orange drum shade above the table! P.

  3. materfamilias
    8 June 2011 / 4:39 am

    Susan: So do I. . . so well edited.
    Patricia: I'm so pleased . . . this is why I posted the photo, because I do think it could inspire decorating or wardrobe palettes. I can just imagine your new dining room. It won't be long now, right?

  4. Patricia
    8 June 2011 / 12:34 pm

    Yes – we leave on 15 July, closing is on 2 August. Hopefully we'll have some time to paint before our things arrive. Before all that, however, our cruise! We leave for Barcelona 23 June, back here 4 July. We can't wait!! :0) P.

  5. Mardel
    8 June 2011 / 2:59 pm

    I love the juxtaposition of man and nature and the muted natural shades punctuated by the orange of paint and rust and again the contrast of man v. nature. Inspiring photo, especially with the soft pink dawning on the horizon.

  6. materfamilias
    9 June 2011 / 4:20 pm

    Patricia: A busy six weeks ahead — lovely that you've built the cruise in as a very nice way to say good-bye to Europe (for now)
    Mardel: Yes! And the manmade lines, as well, against the natural ones — straight against curved, regular against irregular.

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