one thing I observed
I’ll admit it: people who see me on the street are probably thinking I’m weird. Imagine someone stopping in the middle of the road, looking down, pulling out his smartphone and photographing what to most people is nothing more than misplaced garbage. Yep, pretty strange. But for me, these leftovers are often magical.
This battered packaging caught my eyes because of how it clashes with its background in more than one way. The cardboard is light, while the asphalt it is placed on is black. The message it sends (apparently of a glamorous Italian design) clashes perfectly with the hard, dirty road, and with the tire marks decorating it. The perfect precision of the product the package was designed for conflicts with the imperfect shape of the cardboard after it met the hard reality of the street.
one thing I thought of
Like coincidences, contradictions catches our eyes and the attention of our mind. When two things are the opposite of each other, they create contrast. And just like babies focus their attention on contrasting colors, our brain is tuned in to such anomalies.
The tension created by contrasting things is the source of the phrase “opposites attract.” Often, this tension builds magic. It gives a different meaning to both objects, or at least it emphasizes some aspects of them. Contradiction can turn a plain cardboard packaging into a dramatic artifact. It transforms a lifeless object into a story.
one thing to go
Look for opposite things that relate to each other.
