Joslyn Art Museum invites area musicians to interpret art in an open competition

The Art for Your Ears winners have been announced! Check out the winning songs! The artworks that inspired the winning songs will remain on view through October 22, the final day of the exhibition. The artworks will be off view for a short time while the galleries are reinstalled, and will be again on view in Galleries 16 and 17 through the end of the year and beyond.

Once again, congratulations and thank you to all participating musicians! You made a great contribution to a new experimental music project at Joslyn Art Museum.

Musicians, both amateur and professional, are invited to compose original songs interpreting artwork from Joslyn's fall exhibition of contemporary art, Art on the Edge. Songs will be featured on this website, and the public will be able to load them onto their digital audio players prior to visiting the exhibition. Museum-goers are invited to listen to the music tracks as they view the exhibition, encouraging them to spend more time with the art, and inviting new ways of thinking about and experiencing the artworks. Entries will be put to a popular vote and also critiqued by a jury of music and art experts. Approximately ten winners will be chosen; the selected tracks will be featured on this website and in the Art for Your Ears podcast; the winning songs will also be made available on Joslyn’s audio guides.

Mission statement

Art for Your Ears is a unique collaboration between Joslyn Art Museum and the community, challenging local musicians to respond to contemporary works of art with interpretive musical compositions. With this collaboration, the Museum intends to engage a broader community and to allow for multiple points of view to be experienced in the variety of musical interpretations. The use of new technologies provide yet another way to honor the intention of the Museum's founder, Sarah Joslyn: that the museum-goer may be able to enjoy music as a complement to their art-viewing experience.

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