festival of brown
things to to say about brown
think of brown, the disregarded colour, seen but overlooked….
where is the brown segment in the spectrum?
if you split light brown does not fall out.
too earthy for the theorists, too modest for display, excluded from the rainbow, it still has
range and depth, it is adaptable, it’s practical and plain.
it comes near red but hot red turns away to mix with sunny yellow, blend with peaceful blue.
how would we grow without brown?
it holds green up to the sky,
it nourishes.
it stands next to grey and is humble.
muddle all the colours and you will find brown
there (in my experience.)
some say it’s just a tone, like black or white,
but that is quite unfair. brown has warmth:
pale things brown in ovens, pink people turn brown in the sun.
brown is old, it bears the smears of time, the stain,
the smudge of memory.
brown is not outworn. brown is useful, brown is everyday.
or as rich as the burnished auburn of a new conker.
we might just eulogise a little, we might extol......
the autumn field. the soft forest.
soon now all the leaves will be autumns,
there will be nakedness among trees
and everything a still brown that is almost grey.
perhaps due to the hot weather, perhaps due to a previously unknown and inexplicable unavailability of chocolate in portugal, perhaps because of the frankly disgraceful behaviour of that prima donna peter pick, perhaps due to their recent traumatic visit to israel (where they were escorted at all times by armed guards and allowed only to see the airport and the rear of their venue) the MAO-ist guerilla puppet theatre of viana do castelo have withdrawn from their promised performance.
so the headline act, the top billing, the earth-shattering, epoch-making, above-the-title performance of revolutionary chocolate puppeteering is not to be.
the world sighs in disappointment. brown itself is momentarily discouraged.
but we soldier on. your dauntless committee is even now in negotiation with renowned artists in various media in order to shore up the pitiful wreckage of your dreams.
rodrigo brito, the chemical photographer and exponent of surfactants is preparing an exhibit.
abraão moreira of the exclusive click bar and armando martins have taken charge of catering and are organising a concert by renowned performers of the cavacinho.
