#82 Colour

I stay safely in black and white. Partly by choice, partly because I’m colour-blind. Black and white removes that obstacle entirely. Light, shadow, form, those I trust. Using colour always felt like entering a conversation where everyone else seemed to know the language better than I did.

Recently I read Wild Thing: A Life of Paul Gauguin by Sue Prideaux. At one point she describes how the painter talked about what he called “colour gymnastics”. He believed complementary colours carried a kind of spiritual force, he thought that opposites fulfilled each other, like an ideal form of earthly love.

Reading that, I had a small realisation. I’ve spent years assuming there is a “correct” version of colour somewhere out there, and that I’m seeing a slightly defective edition of it. But Gauguin made me realise there’s no such thing as correctness when it comes to colour. He trusted his own perception, even when it led him to improbable results.

That thought is strangely freeing when you’re colour-blind.

So lately I’ve been experimenting with colour in my photographs. Not because I suddenly see it better, but because I stopped worrying about whether I see it right. These are simply the colours that appeal to me.