Monochrome Mania

A couple of weeks ago, a friend and I were lamenting the pop of the Christmas bubble  and confessing a slight feeling of the January blues; in my case, with the ceaseless rain, it was feeling more like the January ‘blue-blacks’.  However, accepting that this is a time when nature and colour should be and is largely dormant, I thought let’s embrace the monochrome of the season.
 
A trip this week to the Photographers’ Gallery, London W1 to see the exhibition ‘David Lynch: The Factory Photographs’ showed me beauty in exploring the depth of detail in contrasting black and white.  Film maker David Lynch (b.1946 USA) is known for his iconic films such as Blue Velvet, Twin Peaks and the earlier cult classic, Eraserhead, all of which are full of atmospheric visual language.  This series of black and white images, shot in places including Lodz, Berlin and New Jersey, focuses on obsolete and abandoned post-industrial architectural spaces – factories having long since emanated their last puff of smoke, now slowly being reclaimed by nature.
 
I was particularly taken by this image shot in Lodz; looking from the inside out, nature is framed by an open factory window, plants shooting up from the ground and creeping up to the building, the tonality of greys evoking a sense of the real colour.

I have long been an aficionada of the striking combination of black and white in interiors: walls painted stark white bouncing light and monochrome vintage furnishings always make a room feel airy and bright.



In ‘Monochrome Reflection’ below I have gone for the theatrical in my display of items: a 1960s illuminated dressing mirror, acting like a picture frame which captures the images of the 1950s Italian flying saucer standing light, the Fase table light and the Frank Stella lithograph and reflects them back to the viewer - a dramatic, highly stylish effect from the use of monochrome items on mass.