I read a WSJ article about a recent London conference celebrating boredom, at which one presenter read aloud "every single one of 415 colors listed in a paint catalog: damson dream, dauphin, dayroom yellow, dead salmon…and on and on and on."
I find so appealing this focus upon painfully ordinary small things, as I suspect them to be levers to move larger ones. However, I also join the attendees in their simple desire occasionally to counteract the modern pace. I believe a certain amount of mental space, even idleness, is necessary for creativity, and that bigger concepts emerge from the empty, rattling frustrations of tedium.
"We're all overstimulated," said Ms. [Jo] Lee. "I think it's important to stop all that for a while and see what several hours of being bored really feels like."
Tying even more closely to our concerns here, link to James Ward's blog post-- he's the conference organizer-- on a classic wintertime BBC program "The Snowman" to follow his methodology for mulling over mundanities, in this case creating logical concerns involving murder and David Bowie.
Given that another of the more-bored conference attendees actually began woolgathering on "Swedish police procedurals," do you think that the fans/authors of crime stories and the deeply and self-aware bored are overlapping sets? : )
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8 comments:
I love this. True boredom is wonderful in its own way. Plus I love the idea of rejecting the modern pace and the artificial "too busy" way.
I can't get over reading "every single one of 415 colors listed in a paint catalog." Good lord, that would be trying.
Here's what I suggest to Ms. Jo Lee: See if you can get permission to attend staff meetings at your local school. The format will go something like this. They distribute a fat packet handouts, which an administrator than proceeds to read aloud. At the end of an hour,I promise you, you will be ready to tear out your fingernails.
Dead salmon?! Who paints a room dead salmon? Even if I liked the color, I'd have to think twice due to the name.
I agree that idleness is sometimes needed for the creative mind to work. I think that's why I'm not as creative when I'm working at school
Dead salmon? I wouldn´t paint my living room that colour either - but perhaps it could be a vivid way of describing a body?
Oh how I wish I had the time to read all 415 colors in a paint catalog. Just having the time to read 50 colors would be nice. I'm afraid that when we were painting our house earlier this year and I had to pick out the colors for each room, I was so pressed for time, as usual, that I picked several of the colors simply because they were the first ones in the general family (blue, yellow, etc.) that my eyes landed on. None was dead salmon, however. Rather, I suspect that the awful color of the kitchen that we finally covered up was dead salmon.
Leah and Charles- I agree about boredom and idleness. it can be wonderful inspiration, but I don't find it very difficult to manage. Still, I like that people are going to such lengths for a really interesting type of boredom.
David, Laura, and Dorte (the Dead Salmon gang)- It's a color that only the really edgy go for.
Elaine- you're lucky that the namers weren't so edgy that Blue turned out to be a subversive name for chartreuse. "It's the way you feel looking at it, not the actual color."
Anita- Perhaps you'll be invited as keynote speaker at the next conference- You sound like an expert!
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