'I see colors when I hear music': artist blends music and painting in new exhibit

The Page-Walker Arts and History Center in Cary, North Carolina, will be hosting Visual Rhapsodies from Sept. 18 to Oct. 12, where the work of artist Marcelle Harwell Pachnowski will be displayed. 

"Marcelle has, I believe, close to 50 years of experience as an artist, and she's explored a number of directions,” said Pachnowski's publicist, Corbie Hill. “I've seen a lot of her work.”

Hill said that since he’s known her, Pachnowski has done non-objective paintings, which differ from abstract paintings. He said that unlike abstract paintings, non-objective paintings don't represent, or aren't meant to represent, anything.

"I also collaborate with her when she paints to live music,” Hill said. “I'm a musician, as well, so I've been organizing musicians to do these improvised shows.”

Pachnowski’s synesthesia causes sound to translate into color and pattern. Pachnowski said that synesthesia can affect more than one sense, and she has been doing more research on the condition.

"I think it's good and very unique to her abilities," said Sage Holden, a UNC sophomore interested in art. "I think it's really interesting how it provides a window into how she sees things, because obviously not all of us have synesthesia, so it lets others see what she can see and associates with music."

Holden said that although she doesn’t do art professionally, she really enjoys it and is considering taking art classes in the future. 

"Merging these two mediums of self-expression of art and performance is really interesting and makes you think a little bit more," Holden said.

Pachnowski said that she has been a working artist for almost 50 years.

“I have had a tremendous amount of experience from teaching for 25 years from all ages, from pre-first through college, senior citizens," Pachnowski said. "You name it, I have taught all sorts of different types of individuals and students and venues.”

Pachnowski said she had been actively trying to pursue showing her art, which she did for the first time in 1971.

“I have done music and art for all my whole entire life," Pachnowski said. "I actually wanted to be a musician when I was very, very young. I did lots of piano and lots of singing.” 

Pachnowski said that growing up, she never really learned how to read music and just played music by ear. She said now in her paintings she is dealing with purely color, movement and texture in the non-objective.

"Abstract is taken from reality,” Pachnowksi said. “If you look at a Picasso, if you look at his development and his career you see that there are distortions. There were extreme distortions and there were some that were much more subtle, now that's abstraction. In non-objective, there is no object, so you're basically dealing with the basic elements of design: color, movement and texture.”

Pachnowski said she starts working by putting paints on her palette and expressing herself on whatever surface she is working on.

"As soon as I hear music, I see colors,” said Pachnowski. “I have since I was a kid. I didn't even know, I just thought everybody had it. I see colors when I hear music. I always paint to music in my studio too, so it's never in silence that I do artwork, it's always in music.”

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