Colors Are A Language

I wrote the following in 2008:

Colors are a language that some of us are compelled to use, just as others use words or music to express themselves. Ten years ago my husband told me he'd signed us up for two weeks of Spanish language classes in San Miguel de Allende. Without consulting my brain, (I swear I don't remember having this thought before I heard myself speak), I said, "I'd really rather learn to paint." When we arrived in Mexico he found us a hotel connected to an old monastery that housed the art school, and I began to paint the next day and have never stopped.

The week I learned to paint (1998)

For sixteen years, until last October, my husband and I owned the Apple Barn Garden Center in New Boston, NH. When I became a painter, I realized that for many people, the garden center was an art supply store and many of my customers were artists (whether they called themselves that or not). I knew this because when I had plants to display and gardens to design, I had no desire to paint -- and I began to understand that working with form and color is a deep-rooted need for many people, and that one mode of expression can replace another, but the basic need is the same.

It's fascinating to me how different people are attracted to different colors and shapes and walk around with visions of paintings and gardens in their minds. Why does one color attract us one day, and another day not so much? Why does pairing one color next to another make my heart race? If you know the answers, let me know.

After we sold the garden center, I lost interest in gardening and painted year round instead. But last year, I revived the garden next to my New Boston studio, and this year I have a garden I'm moderately proud of. But I'm also painting -- reworking a piece I started two years ago, and now, more than ever, I'm sure that if you attached electrodes to my head, you would see the same parts of my brain light up with every color choice I make, with each decision of where a flower or a new color should go. And when I stand back from either my painting or my garden, the same parts of my brain fire when I'm delighted.