2011#06 PI Magazine

Monthly Column Studio Lawrence

Small figures stand in the distance. The figures are surrounded by an enormous white construction made of immense columns rising up from a grey floor. The sole decoration is a modest copper chandelier which hangs at the centre. This is the interior of the Buurkerk, Utrecht, painted by Pieter Saenredam in 1654. In numerous paintings he recorded the ideal Dutch interior; white spaces with functional decoration, an interior deprived of all decoration after the Reformation and the Iconoclastic Fury.
The trail of the Iconoclastic Fury is still clearly visible within Europe. The further south you travel, the more colour and decoration there is to be enjoyed. From Southern Germany and Catholic Bayem, across to the Southern tip of Sicily, colour and decoration spreads far and wide compared with the puritanical North. The Unites States show a similar trend. Where the Founding Fathers landed, they brought their Protestant colour card along with them. Boston is predominantly white where southern New Orleans, founded by the French, is packed with colour.
The British Isles has managed to steer clear from this pattern seen on the continent. Here in the UK there is a living and thriving tradition of using colour within interiors. The colours and finishes created by heritage British paint-maker Farrow & Ball are historically rooted. The colours used to restore National Trust estates by Farrow & Ball were recreated with meticulous research and are as close to the original palettes as possible. Britain is well known for fusing colour with function; the iconic red buses, red telephone boxes and post boxes for example. In the sprawling backstreets of Notting Hill, houses were painted in vibrant colours during the Fifties to encourage lacking sales. Nowadays houses on these streets are priceless and a tourist attraction; colour served its purpose. Looking further back, over time the Anglican Church made a pragmatic mix of Catholic and Protestant convictions while the tradition of the Grand Tour has introduced generations of Britons to the vivid colour palettes of Southern Europe. Meanwhile in Holland, rather than grasping at this rich heritage of colour, we have only gained the word ‘tourist’.
A large ochre bed points into the space. The bedroom has lavender walls and doors.  Accompanying the bed are two ochre reed chairs and a little table. On two walls hang paintings. The view from the room is yellow and on top of the bed is a striking red blanket. This is ‘The Bedroom’, a painting by Vincent van Gogh of his own bedroom in the ‘Yellow House’ in Arles. Back in Holland this vicar’s son struggled with the use of colour during his Peasant Life paintings which were full of browns and blacks. Whereas, in the Southern French town of Arles his use of colour blossomed. The two years he spent in the South of France were his most productive years and the colourful paintings he created form the foundation of his fame.
Are you travelling South as a tourist this Summer? Do as the Britons have done for centuries and bring home more than just a brown tan.