Container Land

For someone who craves the light, migrates to it lizard like, my first impressions of the streets around where we live are not one of the excited big camera wearing first time traveller to Barcelona, I have no desire to spend hours wandering through these pathways discovering.

The tapestry of wooden windows, railings, washing, shutters, and balustrades that I can see from our inner courtyard is beautiful because the light has space to move about here. It plays it bounces.

The surrounding streets away from the park side and towards Gotic are like being on a cargo ship, maybe not on the ship but waiting by the dock, as we nearly are. Rows and rows of containers all pilled up high make dark corridors. But unlike the docks the containers are not bolted up, sometimes their personal contents spill out onto the street as billowing sheets. Huge plants tumble out from tiny ledges of balconies, touching the other side, stealing the white as it falls.

Glimpses of light appear at the end of rows where it has squeezed past. Alone on your corridor you see ‘The Shinning’ like, people flit past the ends, their voices carry towards you for a moment and then gone.

The streets are not at all scary, just dark. To me light is what reveals beauty, so at present I cant see the beauty, I tend to head to the sea and the open spaces.

But I know you need shading to reveal form. Maybe as Barcelona heats up and I go to the studio, which is scorched in full light, I will understand these dark piled high spaces and will be thankful.