Sitting at Starbucks, I couldn’t help but notice this really interesting painting hanging on the wall next to my table. I really liked it because it was colorful and unlike most paintings. It was curvy, colorful and semi-detailed. It depicted a man playing the guitar, but he looks as if he is really feeling his music. Then it hit me; the shapes in the background depict the notes he is playing. Every time he strums his guitar, it makes waves in the background. There is also a brown windy road, which makes me think that music opens up a lot of doors if they remain on that particular path.
After doing some research (and reading the explanation beneath the painting) I found out that Jay Adlers is the artist and the piece is called “Bend in the Road.” The painting was inspired by Adlers’ friend from home, Quincy Mumford. Mumford was about to put out his second album and asked Adlers to design him an album cover. The two never actually saw eye to eye on the piece so he never used it as his album cover. So Adlers kept adding on to the piece. The concept of living the moment between two transitional periods of life became his main focus along with attempting to illustrate ‘the zone’ that artists and musicians share a passion for. This went along with my perception of the guitarist feeling the music. He seems so wrapped up in his music, and you can see his passion. Adlers says, “That place we all go to bend reality around our visions, where logic and potentiality take over seamlessly.” To me, this means that the long, windy road represents an escape from reality, and the guitarist does so through his music. Adlers also liked the idea of being caught between winter and summer both metaphorically and literally, which is where I think the blue, purple and green waves in the background come from. I think that it’s a representation of his love/hate relationship with the seasons since he is from New Jersey. He says many people would just hibernate but he used it as a time to create and reflect, which is where the inspiration for this painting most likely came from.