Painted musical representation and mnemonics
Juliet Kac, R. F. Paton · 2004
Background in art history and theory. Specific interest – the relationship between painting and music. Della Francesca (c1415-1487) used musical ratios as a compositional device in his paintings (Bouleau, 1963). Colour in Poussin’s (1594?-1665) paintings convey moods analogous to the modes representing the keys in early music, and Delacroix’s (1798-1863) use of colour is associated with mood and a ‘musical quality ’ (Lockspeiser, 1973). An exhibition of paintings in Madrid (2003) at the Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza gallery titled ‘Musical Analogies, Kandinsky and his Contemporaries’, testifies both to the diversity of interpretations of artists working within the parameters of this subject within the first few decades of the 20th century in Europe and to the present interest in this subject. Background in music psychology. Meyer (1956) speaks of the absolutist point of view where ‘Musical meaning lies exclusively within the context of the work itself, in the perception of the relationships set forth within the musical work of art”(p.1) Rod Paton (2001) mentioned that “Jan Kapr... maintained that the visual beauty of a notated score was an important factor and a very real part of the experience of the sound... the patterns can be perceived visually and the formal logic is revealed even to those who might not be able to read music in order to re-create it as sound”. Aims. To investigate the relationship between the language of music and that of painting; to develop a visual interpretation of a specific piece of music which, when ‘seen and read’, presents a new way of understanding the structure and communicative powers of music and enhances the appreciation and recall of the music.