Journal
The Colours of Naples Fishing Nets
The flat I stay in in Naples is about a three-minute walk from the sea. Most days I walk right along the promenade from the shops at one end, past the ice cream shops and the disused park, all the way to where the fishermen land their catches.
It has been so stormy here lately. Nets have been piled up into big bins, discarded, tangled together. I walked past them on the way out and didn’t think much of it. But on the way back, I stopped.
Layers of red and rust and deep orange tangled up with turquoise and yellow, all faded and salt-stained. I took out my phone and snapped these images.
Working materials age in ways you can’t design on purpose. The sun and the salt have done their own slow altering of hue.
Every net is a different weight, a different mesh, a different stage of wear. The rust coloured floats sit in the folds like worry beads. The whole thing looked more like a textile installation than a working harbour.
I have no particular plan, no project in mind. Just colour and texture worth paying attention to.
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