Music and art, like two sides of the same coin, have a profound influence on each other. It is apparent to see how artists from these two disciplines would be inspired by the same idea. For example, it’s hard not to look at a Monet without hearing Debussy because they were both capturing an impression of a moment. The same is true with Picasso and Stravinsky as both were intent on destroying the rules of their chosen art form and remaking them for a new century. And these two artistic geniuses were friends, so of course, their ideas fed into each other’s work.
In the 19th century, African American communities of New Orleans were responsible for the birth of Jazz, which has roots in West African culture and musical expression that planted seeds in American music traditions that spanned the blues and ragtime, which of course led to rock and roll. American Jazz was influential to the abstract expressionist, which Ed Harris so powerfully portrayed in his journey into the mind and creative force of Jackson Pollock. It is easy to see the impact that the free form of Jazz had on an artist like Pollock – it was a license to express freely and within the random notes are patterns and rhythms, as is the case with Pollock’s drip paintings, that seem as random as nature itself. But in reality, the drips and overlapping lines were visual melodies that build to create an overall fusion of chaos and order.
Another music dating back to the 8th and 9th century based on a new meter is Eastern Indian Raga music. The term raga means melodic format with reoccurring rhythms; it also permits an emotional state or affection or desire. Raga comes from the Sanskrit word, color, or a tint. It was no surprise to me that when I met Shane Guffogg in 2001 at his Los Angeles studio, I entered an exploration of sight and sound. After leaving the chaos and the noise of the outside world, nothing could prepare me more for the studio sanctuary I stepped into. Upon hearing the calming rhythms of the raga melody, I saw visual music before me in the form of four large (96” x 78”) illuminating paintings that Guffogg was working on. The presence of these works seemed larger than life, the music and the paintings meshed into one and me standing there taking it all in became the third component, transporting me to a place within myself that was both new and familiar.
Guffogg set out to create a body of work that he could escape to called Avalon, the title coming from the mythical island where King Arthur went to heal and recover from his wounds after the Battle of Camlann. Guffogg found his isle by imagining the four seasons and transcribing the look and feel of each through patterned lines and color. The word Avalon is Latin and means “the isle of fruit or apple trees,” and it is the legendary island featured in much of the Arthurian legend. It first appeared in Geoffrey of Monmouth’s pseudo-historical account (1136) of Historia Regum Britanniae, “The History of the Kings of Britain.” Seeing these four heroic-sized canvases with their enormous cascade of mystical light and patterns painted across the surface, coupled with the rhythmic musical notes of Raga music, left me breathless. A painting of golden light, mystical tones, traces of human remembrance – these paintings echo a higher vibration, creating a feeling of expansion, reminiscent of, if not summoning the multiple layers of raga music. I am confident that the music helped transport Guffogg into the next ten years where he perfected his pattern paintings that were influenced by a musical note and subliminal suggestions that attract love. I believe this is what Guffogg set out to create, and as the viewer I experienced it.
I remember asking why he listened to Indian Raga music and his response was very concise – the music emptied his mind and allowed him to be in the moment. I realized that these paintings were visualizations of time and space in a pure but abstract way. I then asked when did he start listening to Raga music? He was also very quick to say he was first introduced to Indian music via the Beatles and when he was a student at Cal Arts, the musicians that played on the Beatles albums taught there and would sometimes have concerts that he would attend. He went on to say that his first studio space at Cal Arts was down the hall from the African percussion music room and there was always drum sounds echoing down the hall from one direction and at the other end of the hall a Chinese student would practice her cello, usually playing Bach. He said, “I would leave my studio door open to let the music from both ends of the hall float in, keeping me company while I painted. It was world music before the term became so commonly used and before CD’s and certainly before the internet and streaming music. I grew up in a very rural area and there wasn’t much variety on the radio. At Cal Arts, there was often lunchtime Jazz concert somewhere on campus and of course classical music concerts. It was a portal for me to a place where sound was thought in its purest form.” There is a long history to the influences of Eastern music on the western mind. George Harrison was captivated by Upanishad Hindu writings like the Bhagavad Gita and spent much time in India studying music and meditation. Harrison worked closely with Ravi Shankar, and songs like, Within You Without came about, which evokes the Indian devotional tradition, while the overtly spiritual quality of the lyrics reflects Harrison’s absorption in Hindu philosophy and the teachings of the Vedas.
Cut to the gritty music of the Velvet Underground and the subculture of New York and its hard not to see the influence that they had on Warhol and vice versa. The direct line to the central nervous system – Warhol’s flat, silk-screened images of pop icons and soup cans. They slap hard and have no melody, no nuance that the previous generation of artists had. The same is true with Lou Reed’s direct, no non-sense depictions of anxiety, loss, and longing for relevance and purpose. They are two sides of the same coin. The Talking Heads were inspired and influenced by Ed Ruscha’s wordplay and went so far as to use one of his paintings titled, Sand in the Vaseline, for an album cover. Again, it isn’t hard to see the influences of one genre to another and back again.
The next level of these connections is synthesis. I have heard Guffogg say on many occasions that he hears his paintings and when he listens to music, sees colors. Are his paintings like a visualization of a morning raga? Or maybe he is communing with his favorite piece by Eric Satie, Gymnopedie. Satie’s notes glide slowly from one bar to the next as if they are moving without the constraints of gravity. The same could be said about Guffogg’s personal calligraphy, which is a direct line to thought or possibly, what he sees with his mind’s eye when he listens to Satie? The list of connections between the visual and audible senses are as limitless as the daily formations of clouds. There are no algorithms that can predict exactly what shape the clouds will form next week or even tomorrow. That is the beauty of sight – we get to see this forever changing moment of wonder. There is no way for Guffogg to know what his response will be to the sounds that he sees. As he often says, “It is all a process. My “job” is to be present and in the moment. Something that sounds so simple, can be so hard.” It’s the process, which is what is translated through paint on canvas. And there is where the visual symphony begins.
SHANE GUFFOGG 