Painter Nicola Wiltshire Talks About The Influence Music Has On Her Creative Practice
Paintings on patterned fabric.
Visual art and music have numerous parallels and share elements such as harmony, balance, rhythm, and repetition. I spoke to the ever so enchanting and incredibly talented painter Nicola Wiltshire about the influence music has had on her work and which songs have triggered emotional responses to her art.
Nicola makes paintings on patterned fabric, using a language of bold charcoal lines, intense handmade oil color and an abstraction of form into playful and calming shapes.
Hello, Nicola! I’m curious about what you like to listen to when you're painting?
Hello! I listen to some music for nothing but pure fun and energy, or some is more deliberate and thoughtful. My studio is at home, so I'm surrounded by domestic comforts, including a CD player and a huge stack of CDs, which include everything from Jimi Hendrix and Velvet Underground to The Thrills and Queens Of The Stone Age. The process of picking the next CD is almost ritualistic, a little pause to direct the next hour of painting.
Sound is such an integral part of our surroundings. Have you ever found a sound or piece of music has triggered a response to your work?
The first song that comes to mind is one I know nothing about. It's called I Am You by a band called LOVE. It was 2019, a year so busy that I didn't feel in control. When the song came on it felt like there was suddenly this space for me to think. There's a beautiful line in the song - 'I am you and you are me, whoever sees' - that inspired me to create a diptych. Each panel features a houseplant, which I think of as separate worlds with their own needs and characteristics. Just like us.
The flow state is an absolute requirement for making art. Do you find that listening to music helps you find your flow?
It depends. Sometimes I feel like my mind is so noisy that all I need is silence. Other times I love nothing more than being taken away by music. Smashing Pumpkins are good at that. It's so easy to connect to their creative energy, which is inspiring. Music is so active and full of life. It's a perfect partner for painting.
Music can be very useful in guiding artistic intentions through brush marks and color choices. Do you think this applies to your practice?
This is a difficult question. I feel like this would be an absolute yes for an abstract painter perhaps; someone who makes quite gestural work on large canvases. This approach to painting is so physical, almost like a dance. My work is quite tight and controlled, which is hard to admit. I'm not sure whether music actually influences the painting process, or if it just helps me to access myself. It's blurry because color is so emotional - it could be a response to the way the music is making me feel. Or it could just be a culmination of everything.
Check out her work here.
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