Yellow has not only found a place in visual art, but also in music. Twenty students from the Conservatory of Amsterdam created new pieces of music based on works from the exhibition Yellow. Beyond Van Gogh’s Colour. Listen to them all.
In Cuno Amiet's painting The Yellow Hill, yellow stands out against the surrounding colours through its intensity and brightness. In the music, this is echoed by the horn in the foreground. Around it, a second layer of cello, piano, bass clarinet and processed voices creates a soundscape that follows the colour palette and deepens the experience of yellow.
Meditate with Yellow is a process-driven live music work that translates yellow into sound. Through a strict system converting painted pixels into musical notes, the synthesizer and piano articulate subtle chromatic variations. Small shifts in colour and sound trace inner states of awareness. They invite both the makers and the audience into a shared space of calm and attention.
Stolen Time by Novits reflects on lost time. Inspired by Decadent Young Woman, after the Dance by the painter Ramon Casas, the work tells the story of someone looking back on a ballroom scene; an evening in which people dance in search of truth.
This composition responds to the unsettling yellow atmosphere of Marc Chagall’s The Yellow Room. Built around a repeating motif, the music evokes Paris and Belarus, and an artist far from his roots. Fragments slowly blur and shift as the sound guides you through the space, making its tension and longing tangible.
Going to the Ball and Back is an expansion of Joseph Mallord William Turner's painting Going to the Ball (San Martino). The music follows a continuously repeating cycle of day and night, marked by distant city bells. As you listen, an immersive experience unfolds, inviting you to discover at what moment of the day or night you encounter this music.