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ADRIENNE's KITCHEN
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Adrienne
Hair:
Medium brown and growing out
Height: Average
Weight: Drinks
coffee
Age: Born in the seventies. Heavily influenced by KC and the
Sunshine Band
Nationality: Southern Fried
Occupation: Social
worker
Pets: Black labrador. Likes to take in abandoned kitties and
find homes for them.
Hobbies: Collecting pig memorabilia, baking ham
and corn pies, late night browsing at Wal-Mart
This kitchen is not about what Adrienne is, but about
what Adrienne could have been had she been a mother ensconced in a
somewhat more profitable-than-average neighborhood sometime between, say
three years after Jackie O, in a Chanel pill-box hat, clambered onto the
back of a convertible in Dallas, Texas, and when she betrayed America
and the fallen Camelot by marrying a Greek tycoon.
Rather than
being roused out of heavy slumber by the alarm in which she invests
religious faith, walking the dog and speeding off to work in a sporty
oversized vehicle, had Adrienne been around in the sixties she could
have had this kitchen in which she would likely have spent the majority
of her day (if she wasn't spending it in the kitchen of one of her many
suburban friends) though, admittedly, the drama of this unisex,
no-nonsense "ain't we cookin' now" Hollywood set would have
been severely inhibited by the addition of a breakfast dinette and
soiled kitchen towels hanging from the cabinet pulls), a concession to
real life that Adrienne could not have foreseen in the architect's
renderings. A television on a brass-toned rolling stand somewhere off to
the right, each morning she would have kept abreast of current events
with The Today Show. As the morning wore on, she would have changed from
her quilted housecoat into feminine slacks (zipper on the side or up the
back) and an appropriately coordinated top, then retired again to the
kitchen to drink coffee, smoke cigarettes and attend to bills or
correspondence, attended by the gay applause of game shows, sound of the
vacuum running somewhere beyond the door, in the distant living room,
maneuvered by the sub-culture (Negro or Hispanic) maid. Had she then
some appointments to attend to, or errands to run, she would have
changed into a casually pert and polyester wrinkle-free dress--but watch
that clock! If the maid doesn't drive she must be done with her outings
in time to pick up Susy or William at the elementary school (she not
being old enough yet to have one child each in primary, secondary and
senior high school).
This kitchen has a
sterility that the designer has sought to pass off as a
conceptually-whole space which you don't have to worry about
personalizing as it already "is" and is therefore also
supposedly of ultimate serviceability as it is complete unto itself.
Maybe that's why I can imagine best Maureen O'Hara in this kitchen, as
if it would take her bright red hair and fire to to balance it.
The conceptually-whole
environment is the genie in the bottle that will make your dreams
come true, getting
along best with those who are looking for spaces
that demand nothing of them.
The picture of this
kitchen is from Disney's Wonderful World of Knowledge, Volume 12,
copyright 1971, which was an updated and enlarged English version of
an encyclopedia "printed in the Italian language by Arnoldo
Mondadori in Milan. The picture comes out of the chapter titled, "Automation--What
it is and how it works." The copy accompanying the picture reads,
A housewife's dream--a kitchen staffed (up to a point) by robots.
A robot controls the heat on the burners and in the ovens. It turns
the ovens on and off. A robot keeps the refrigerator cold and frost
free. It supplies the family with ice. Another robot washes and dries
the dishes. A robot in the sink chews up the garbage. And all this
while other robots are keeping the house warm in the winterand cool in
the summer.
Now, what's funny is that I didn't read any
of this, or the chapters before writing what I did about the picture.
I was quickly glancing through the book this afternoon, looking at the
pictures, and saw this photo and thought this was where I would start
off my piece on Adrienne, about what she could have been if she was
not who she is.
Oh, and by the way, the pig flying is
an original creation by a woman named Kitty. I can't find her website
now to give her credit for it. She said one was welcome to use the gif if one gave the credit.
Assorted people |
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