Before I came to live in Ireland I wasn't very keen on the colour orange. I think that, having grown up in the 70s, I had bad memories of brown and orange swirly carpets and curtains (I didn't like brown much either). Orange seemed a brash colour lacking subtlety. Although I witnessed a lot of autumns before, it was when I came to live in Leitrim that I really began to see the colours clearly. Our mountain is only green for a few months in the summer, then it turns a shade of ginger in the autumn sun before going brown, except for the white patches where the rocks show through, like the bones of the land. The oak leaves can be bright green along one edge while the middle is spotted yellow and another edge golden. Then there is the bracken lining much of the lane, changing to great clumps of bright orange that shifts to rusty red and finally to a gentle pale brown before dying altogether. On the Sunday after Samhain I took my camera along the lanes to try and capture some of these glorious warm colours that seem to leap into my eyes and send a shiver of joy through my body. They may seem oversaturated, but I assure you they are as true to what I am seeing as I can get. Autumn may be the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness, but for me it is also the season of vibrant orange that blasts its way into my blood like one last memory of summer's highest heat before I sink into the dark dreaming of winter.
Jun 06, 2021
PAINTING IN LOCKDOWN 2020
Nov 04, 2019
FALLING FOR ORANGE