orlaquote .

I love following Orla Gartland on Twitter. She tweets some of the coolest and most interesting things. Hate on twitter all you want, but it's fun. Well I can't really remember if she legit tweeted this or it was on something else, maybe her bio or something? But she had this quote, "as painters paint on canvas, musicians paint on silence." I'll give a moment for that to sink in.


That is about the coolest metaphor I have seriously ever heard. I've indulged a little bit in the arts, and enjoy all the different media. But I never thought of music as one of them. And the image of silence sitting in tranquility and then being disturbed by a musician's handiwork just really gets to me.

As the notes strike, the painter wistfully slides the brush through the paper, and the rhythm is displayed in each stroke. The intensity of the beat shows, and vibrant colors lure the viewer into a sort of toxic state. Drugged by the notes that bound through silent ear canals, en route to the rest of the body, every listener feels tingles rushing out to the extremities of their body. The internal organs assimilate with the music and the steady heartbeat quickens to match the thump of the bass. Blood rushes through all the veins and capillaries and it begins to pump faster as the tempo increases.

The artist more fiercely slabs paint onto the canvas. Simpler strokes with less charisma are lost under the strong tones of the thudding downbeats.

As time progresses, the musician and artist draw closer  together, until, no longer alone, they become one. They are one in the same. The artist feels the pulses drawing him towards each stroke, the pulses in his veins, and his eyes alight with the fire of sound. For it is in this phenomenological world that only the aurally afflicted survive on.