Gabriel Sames

Music has always felt like more than vibrations in the ear to me. When I listen, I see things: shapes, colors, motion. Hearing Shapes is my first step into investigating that, starting with a simple question: what do these songs actually look like?

The plan was to write each song, then paint what I saw. It didn’t stay that simple. Every time I thought a song was finished, the painting would find something the song didn’t have, so I’d go back into the music and change what I heard. The two went back and forth until they felt in harmony. When I hear Snowfall, I see a story: colors and shapes moving until they settle into the exact colors and forms that ended up on the canvas.

The headphones were deliberate. Art is personal, and in a crowded room it’s easy to let other people’s reactions shape your own. I wanted each person to have the painting and its song to themselves, and to come to their own conclusions.

What I hope people take with them is a little more attention to the details that connect us to the world around us.

There’s more to life than what we see and what reaches the ear.

I’m now finishing an album, and once it’s done, I’ll paint each of its songs. Hearing Shapes was the first chapter.