"Blue Emergency Light" - I’ve chosen the title Color and Light for my explorative series. Life in urban America is saturated in man-made light; its ubiquitous presence has a proportionally significant effect on our psychology. Each electric light is characterized by by both utility and mood, crafting a narrative rich with semiotic structure, and yet the average person may not be able to articulate how, or why, light impacts them. I endeavored to examine lights which particularly influenced me. This blue light is located above an emergency telephone; it’s sole function is to call attention to the box, and to the possibility of finding help if under duress. The “if” is vast, the possibility one of many refractions, just like the blue plastic encasement. The systematic, geometric design is entirely modern, a rigid obstruction to the elucidation held within. It therefore describes a repressive fragmentation of thought and clarity in contemporary urban culture.

 

"Blue Bottles in Front of Red Light" - This photo was taken at a restaurant in Tokyo. I was struck by the effect of the large red light on the blue glass of the bottles. The set up is entirely artificial, the rigid placement and sequence of the bottles lending to the contrived context. And yet the result is celestial; the dynamic colors and galaxy-like clusters of light reclaim the impression of the composition. Juxtaposed with the bottle formation, an aggressive battle between the dominion of man and nature plays out. The pervasive clusters, appearing both within and outside of the bottles, speak to which side wins out, and produces a vibrant harmony of object and space.

"Amber Lamp" - This photo was taken at my aunt and uncle’s cabin in Northern California. The lamp photographed is a FL/Y Icon Suspension Pendant, made by designer Ferruccio Laviani for Kartell. The sleek, artful form of the lamp was incongruous with much of the surrounding environment, and highlighted the isolation of the cabin and the electric light it produced. The image is tenebrist in result, the amber bubble serving to further detach and diminish the light in an otherwise empty environment. The light is “occluded by form,” and on the verge of fading in an active darkness. Like the Blue Bottles photo, the sun-like quality of the orb and its surrounding darkness implies that of a celestial object. Unlike in Blue Bottles, the space is dominated by the oppressive darkness, and instead of a harmonizing expanse, we are left with internal disharmony and tension, and a prevailing need for relief.