white houses

so today 3D design was canceled due to graduate student studio reviews and my teacher was needed to help review. so my friend michael and i walk over to the millrace studio area across the way from campus.

so, i've been through this place many times, so i'm vaguely familiar with it, but i've never truly explored it until today.. and oh my word.

it's the scattering of white houses and studio buildings interspersed with trees and grassy lawns and gardens, which at this point of the year are all dead and gray, but i remember back in september they were beautiful. a favorite spot was the urban garden, this little expanse of land that had sunflowers and pear trees and all different kinds of flora that spread all over the fence wiring. it's wonderful.

anyways, the studios are all in these white buildings. we go through the sculpture building; get inspired to use my hands more often. we go through the development lab & photo studios; get inspired to take more pictures, particularly with film. walk upstairs, paintings on display are phenomenal. all over the walls are characteristic art building touches. like a hand coming out of a corner junction of walls, drawing doodle lines. or this awesomely colorful painted texture design dispersed throughout the painting hallway.

the studios themselves are wonderful. some are lofts. some have wooden floors and high ceilings and large gridded windows that open outwards. the one i was most surprised with, however, was a little white house tucked away behind a gathering of trees. michael and i walk to the front of it, and i am immediately smitten. medium sized porch with a bench swing. two stories. we walk up the stairs and through the beautiful doorway, taking note of the vintage doorbell. the great room awkwardly has a long conference table right in the middle of it, but i am drawn to the left side, where there are built in bookshelves next to the fireplace. the shelves are packed, jam packed, with old books. encyclopedias, old childrens stories, natural health remedies, all covered in dust. michael is drawn to the right side of the room, where a new projector is hung from the ceiling, projecting a blank white screen onto the bare white wall.

what i see in my head: deep red rug, worn in sofa and reading chairs, a dark coffee table (perhaps a trunk) with mugs and candles and books strewn about, a cat.

we meander through the rest of the house, where in each bedroom an artist has set up a studio of art that i really don't quite comprehend or, crudely, don't appreciate. but i envy their studio immensely. michael and i are done browsing after a short 10 minutes and, instead, opt to sit on the porch swing and talk for about an hour. afterwards we stroll through the grounds again, taking note of how awesome of a place this is going to be in springtime, full of life and color instead of gray. even the stream that runs adjacent to the grounds is dark and shallow. but i ignore it all because we are talking of possible future studios for ourselves.