Does Procreation Destroy A Home's Aesthetic?

After our fire, my husband and I paid the original cost of the art to salvage some of our more sentimental pieces (including a Heidi Conrod oil painting whose new smoky finish lent it a certain other-worldliness, and a massive Duncan Johnson piece that continued to smell like a chemical BBQ for months afterwards).

We then used some of our insurance money to buy a few more oil paintings, a double-headed Kristy Langer polar bear, and a whimsical Heather Goodchild diorama.

It's only recently that folks have started pointing out to us that our tastes are rather dark, a judgement that seems to be facilitated by the fact that we will soon be parents.

This weekend, we had friends and their one-year-old over for a visit and the chaos that is the world of young-uns commenced. In the arm's reach of a child, all cherished objects become either projectiles or landing pads.

Cleaning up some salsa spatter from the cover of the latest Art Review, I self-consciously touched my expanding pregnant belly.

I considered our possessions in a new light: our hanging paintings (bulls' eyes for baby pee streams?), our polar bear installation (would the bared fangs accidentally bang into our newborn's fontanel creating permanent brain damage?) and the diorama of a murder scene beside the bed (would the bloody axe be a deadly choking hazard?)

When I told my mom that my husband wanted to hang his Chairman Mao portrait in the nursery (thereby necessitating a red and black colour theme for the room) she paused before moaning. "Noooooo. Not for a baby."

I weakly argued that red and black are the first colours a baby can discern and that perhaps old Mao could aid in our kid's cognitive development. But inside I too was thinking: How much longer can we keep our aesthetic identities in check before caving into the power of pastels and primary colours?

Some folks with kids manage to keep their cool look, like blogger Jim Harbison and his wife. However, I am not sure my hubs and I are that cool or that competent with room design. And Jim's look doesn't appear to include a diorama called "Motherless Children" or an illustration of a pile of steaming dog turd.

Will we be replacing oil paintings with Dora place mats?

Probably not. But just as the fire drew us to art with obtuse and dangerous narratives, perhaps the experience of parenthood will inspire a new creative perspective.

Then again, I can't imagine anything more terrifying than raising a child.