Since yesterday, I have this nagging thought about "black and white".
I'm not sure what triggered it, maybe because, while driving to visit some friends, I turned the radio on and heard Michael Jackson's famous song: Black Or White. A sentence he repeats many times is "I said if you're thinkin' of being my brother it don't matter if you're Black Or White". Then he concludes: "I'm not going to spend my life being a Color!". Although it's kind of funny to know that Jacko went to many troubles to change his skin color!
Whoever Jackson is and no matter how he behaves, I like the song because it expresses in a way how we should accept each other even if we're different. No matter the color of our skin, our religion, our nationality, our language, our political affiliations... We should find a way to live peacefully together.
Still... There is something else that I wanted to write about in this blog.
"Black and White" is also a funny expression that I heard from a friend while he talked about anyone or anything old. He would say something like "this guy is quite old; he's from the black and white era...", referring to TV screens a few years back. We use it a lot since! Not in a derogatory way, just for fun. After all, I'm not a kid anymore ;-)
Of course the term is used to describe a number of forms of visual arts. And personally I like black and white photography very much. Maybe because the lack of colors make me able to concentrate more on the subjects in picture, on their expressions and the feelings they're trying to convey.
But, in this case, "Black and white" as a description is not very accurate, for in addition to black and white most of these media included varying shades of grey. This is for me the link with the first topic with which I started this post.
How can anyone just categorize people under one label or another. We forget that there are so many shades in life. Much more than the shades of grey. Even more than the millions of color existing in the nature. Each person is unique. Relating to people can't start with prefabricated thoughts.
Discovering a person is an exciting adventure that help widening my horizons, only if I begin this journey with an open mind and a wide spirit.
I'm not sure what triggered it, maybe because, while driving to visit some friends, I turned the radio on and heard Michael Jackson's famous song: Black Or White. A sentence he repeats many times is "I said if you're thinkin' of being my brother it don't matter if you're Black Or White". Then he concludes: "I'm not going to spend my life being a Color!". Although it's kind of funny to know that Jacko went to many troubles to change his skin color!Whoever Jackson is and no matter how he behaves, I like the song because it expresses in a way how we should accept each other even if we're different. No matter the color of our skin, our religion, our nationality, our language, our political affiliations... We should find a way to live peacefully together.
Still... There is something else that I wanted to write about in this blog.
"Black and White" is also a funny expression that I heard from a friend while he talked about anyone or anything old. He would say something like "this guy is quite old; he's from the black and white era...", referring to TV screens a few years back. We use it a lot since! Not in a derogatory way, just for fun. After all, I'm not a kid anymore ;-)
Of course the term is used to describe a number of forms of visual arts. And personally I like black and white photography very much. Maybe because the lack of colors make me able to concentrate more on the subjects in picture, on their expressions and the feelings they're trying to convey.
But, in this case, "Black and white" as a description is not very accurate, for in addition to black and white most of these media included varying shades of grey. This is for me the link with the first topic with which I started this post.How can anyone just categorize people under one label or another. We forget that there are so many shades in life. Much more than the shades of grey. Even more than the millions of color existing in the nature. Each person is unique. Relating to people can't start with prefabricated thoughts.
Discovering a person is an exciting adventure that help widening my horizons, only if I begin this journey with an open mind and a wide spirit.
2 comments:
I love B&W.
The term.
The Concept.
The Song.
The Album.
I prefer B&W photos.
I am interested in B&W art.
Something in the hues of these two colors that soothes the vision and rests the perception.
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Micheal Jackson, or Wacko Jacko, had an early accident while singing on the stage with his family, and damaged his hair, skin and part of his face. The accident's traces were healed through many plastic surgeries, but they left him with a rare disease that turns his skin into white in patches.
Jackson went through hell just to achieve his name. His dancing trainer (the same choreographer of Dalida) said that he had never trained someone so flexible and fluent in using his body.
When he married Lisa Elvis Presley, his wife said that I never saw his real face .. it was always behind masks of creams and potions and makeup!!
He was a man inside a man.
Or, whether a monster inside a man?
Who can tell?
Who can judge?
Not me, for sure.
What I want to reach is that sometimes we see things in colors, yet, their true meaning is not much interpreted as their colors are. Sometimes, the color gives a fake identity of the true personlity of a person, or of the authentic origin of a matter. Color is a modification added after the discovery of so many colored pigments. They are a luxury to the eye, not an addition to the meaning of the concepts around us.
So, acceptence or refusal has to be strictly done objectively, because oneday, all colors are going to be dropped, and we would have to stick to the colorless choice of ours. So, pray it would be the right one.
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As for the term .. from the era of B & W ..
I have heard and used it for some times ..
But I prefer using other terms to describe such a state.
I belive that the term took its fame, after the invention of colored TVs, just as you have mentioned.
Naturally, color has accompanied Man from his first days upon Earth. So, why we differentiate between an era and another. The reason lies in a creation or invention that set the distinguishing difference between something in the past an another in our reality. The introduction of color to TVs changed everything.
:-)
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On another side, whether it is an accurate or not to term the Art of B & W as such, I think it is.
Why?
Because when you want to categorize something, you tend to look for the major points, not for the derivatives; the head, not the joints and other aiding parts!
Hence, here: Black and White form the two basic sources of all the other degradations and hues. Thus, they are entitled to be used in the title to define the whole process.
But, you have taken the aspect from a very wide scope. Things are not always calculated in such a way. There has to be a root, there has to be an origin, and there has to be a unity in the world to define it .. To define a Spade by a Spade is Needed but other answers may be applicable, too .. like categorizing a Spade under : Playing Cards .. or under Shapes.
After all, things follow things. So, you have to know what are you going to define.
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Always a pleasure to read you.
You took your time to comment on this post... and when you finally did... it was a blast!
You made see things in a different way. You widen my horizon.
It's a pleasure to discover your thoughts more every day through your writings
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