The beaded curtain
I walked into the room-followed by the swooshing sound of a thousand multi-colored beads. At that moment I was connected to all the greats who have taken that same step, from Mary Tyler Moore to Joanne Mitchell. It’s a moment of noise and fury and evocative of a thousand things.
It’s surprising that beaded curtains ever amounted to anything in western society. Thanks to the 60’s and 70’s beaded curtains became common even clichéd. They remain as iconic of those eras and indeed the very swish noise of someone passing through them is like a mini time machine- well at least for me it is.
What could be more beautiful than a beaded curtain, a translucent division between two rooms? Doors are full of symbolic meaning passing from one reality to the next, transition. In my mind, the beaded curtain makes this metaphor even stronger. The air is suddenly filled with movement like a shadow following someone; the beads are a sound echo of what has just happened. It takes a few minutes for the memory of the passer to finally dispel from the beaded curtain- something a door can’t do.