Writing Spaces

The intensity of the color would drench any writing done here—as indeed it does the music of Verdi, whose villa this was (though perhaps not painted so exuberantly in his time).






image:  Christie B. Cochrell, Verdi's Villa, Sant'Agata

Tucson, February 1996

some running horses, mostly tail—

a rooster painted on the square of glass above the sinks (the left now filled with dirt, like a small planter)

a wire curtain, draped with horseshoes, outside the main doorway

painted blue tiles set one by one into the raw adobe of the kitchen

the prints of horseshoes in the adobe kitchen floor

an open door to the rest of the compound—twelve studios

a potter's wheel and a pot of poppies, oriental or Greek

the stations of the cross (how hard his fall was, the third time, the red color of Indians, not much hope)

the wonderful crown for the desert Indians—silver and jeweled sajuaros and turquoise; tiny figures going about their business.  A crown of the sajuaro harvest; a crown of thanksgiving.

the rough wood lintel with ceramic horses or bulls, unshaped, running across it

rough frescos in the wall:  three panels each

rocks painted turquoise in a kind of wash, tumbled slag heaps

the mine shaft doorways, the cross-sections of cactus stem set polished into the floor like polished redwood burls, like flowers or sea creatures

colored metal flowers in the bare branches

cupped ceramic cactus leaves, prickly pear, the size of ping-pong paddles, turquoise blue

rough blue-washed earthen walls (or yellow or pink)

the perfect chapel with twig bars in its adobe belfry; the joyful colors within

—Christie