The Pillow Story

Throughout his career Dürer looked at ordinary life and saw it for the unlikely, estatic, jewel-filled pantheon it is. One of the most beautiful and unexpectedly moving sketches in the world was completed by him in 1493 when he was 22 years old. it shows six pillows, probably his own, in a variety of shapes and positions. On the other side of the paper, Dürer drew himself looking at us with penetration and inquisitiveness, alongside a version of his hand, and, at the bottom, another - seventh pillow.

A pillow has no distinguished place in the order of the universe. We are unlikely ever to have paid much attention to this modest household object. We take its existence for granted, owe it no special gratitude and are unlikely ever to have been detained by its qualities. Like so much else that we are surrounded by, we see it without noticing it. It belongs to a vast category of things which we rely on without for an instant stopping to wonder at, or deriving any satisfaction from them. We are - for the most part - wholly blind.

It may help us greatly that, a long time ago, a genius arrested his gaze in order to tell us that, among the houshold, there might be something worth bothering with, that a pillow, properly considered, might be as interesting as a castle or a nuanced as a poem, and that we have all along been putting our heads down on a treasury.

We spend a lot of time thinking about fame and glory, and no time at all attending to most of what is closest to us, which includes not just our pillows, but also the light at dusk, an afternoon free of commitments, the flowers in the garden, the laughter of a child, the kindness of a friend, a history book on the shelf and the many small moments of harmony and satisfaction that - despite the challenges of our journey - we have already witnessed.