The Eyes of the Skin

Carolina’s Mono Monday theme is ‘Thankful’ and my first thought was to blip the wonderful G - kind, patient, long-suffering, my rock particularly through my times of illness.  But neither of us really feel like portraiture today. I know I’ll take an age to get the shot I want, and we really don’t have time. And of course, I’m thankful for so many things - home and family being uppermost. 

Pride of place in our hall hangs a piece of Simon’s artwork. As an architecture student, he produced an image representing Juhani Pallasmaa’s ‘The Eyes of the Skin’. Basically, it’s an architectural theory which criticises the emphasis of design based solely on sight, arguing that our other senses are just as - if not more - important. 

‘Juhani Pallasmaa argues that the suppression of the other four sensory realms has led to the overall impoverishment of our built environment, often diminishing the emphasis on the spatial experience of a building and architecture’s ability to inspire, engage and be wholly life enhancing.’ 

So Simon presents an architectural drawing of our home - and it’s been our home for over 36 years - into which he places shadows of our family life. They are images taken from memories or photographs of childhood and of growing up; we all feature and I absolutely love it. I had admired the original work, and one Christmas, he presented me with a copy which we had framed. It’s very precious; I’m so thankful for our home, my husband and two wonderful sons, and all the memories we’ve built over the years. I love the fact both boys love returning here - our family Christmas is always very special. 

I’ve added a colour copy as an extra, as well as a recipe for ‘my’ mincemeat (this makes a lot - I usually make half the quantity). Thank you so much for your response to yesterday’s blip. The pastry recipe is in the link below. 
http://simply-veggie.blogspot.com/2011/11/mince-pies.html