When we think about music as an artform we often think of it being closely allied to dance and drama as the ‘performing arts’ but perhaps as more distant from the visual arts. However, throughout history, particularly in Western European cultures, artistic movements have encompassed painting, poetry, music, and even architecture simultaneously.
Performing artists have often been inspired by the work of visual artists, and vice versa. In fact, there is a brilliant example of this at the Luxembourg & Co gallery at the moment with their exhibition Jannis Kounellis: To the sound of pictures, which features violinist Hugo Max and ballerina Kate Hester performing in response to an artwork. (You can find videos of these performances via the link above, if you’re not able to attend in person).
For teachers searching for a link between World Art Day and music, it might be tempting to plan a graphic score activity, where pupils use art to represent music. However, while the use of graphic notation to explore and analyse music in detail can be highly effective, if not handled carefully it can quickly become more of an art activity than a music one. Since most of us don’t have enormous amounts of curriculum time to devote to music, it would be a shame to lose a lesson to art, so why not flip the script and use an artwork as a pre-existing graphic score to create music out of?
For EYFS children you might show a simple picture, perhaps from a story that they are working on at the moment, asking them to tell you what items or characters they can see in the picture that would make a noise, and inviting them to replicate that noise with their voice or body. For example in a picture based on the Three Little Pigs, you might get oinking sounds for the pigs and blowing sounds for the Wolf trying to get into their houses. You could choose a child to point at the various different parts of the picture in an order of their choice, and have the class respond with the right noise, creating their own piece of music.
With your KS1 classes you can take the next step, by asking them not just to recreate the literal sounds within a picture, but the overall look and feel of an artwork. What kind of instrumental sounds would give the impression of sunlight? Which could you use to create an eerie or menacing atmosphere? If the colour red was a sound, what sound would it be? Model this process with one artwork, encouraging pupils to think about mood, colour, and setting, so that they understand they’re not just looking for things within the picture that would make a sound in real life, then send them off in groups with an artwork of their own to turn into a sound painting.
At KS2 you have the opportunity not just to represent the look and feel of the artwork, but the technical process of creating it too. Find a selection of artworks from different artistic movements – for example Pointillism, Impressionism, Cubism, Surrealism – and discuss the artistic techniques used to create these pictures. Each group could be allocated a different movement to represent in music; rather than recreating a particular artwork they would be using the techniques of that artistic movement and translating these into sound. So, for example the Pointillism group would be creating a piece of music using lots of short sounds to represent the idea of a painting made up of dots.
If you did this as a whole school activity, it would also give you the opportunity to celebrate everyone’s work in a ‘sound exhibition’ at the end of the day if you have the time and inclination! Pupils could come up and perform in front of their chosen artwork on the whiteboard, or if you really wanted to go all in you could print the pictures off, display them on the walls around school, and position the groups in front of the relevant picture ready to perform as the ‘gallery visitors’ (teachers, governors, parents etc) walk by.
If you decide to carry out any of these activities for World Art Day on 15th April, please do tag us in your social posts celebrating these – we’d love to see your children’s work!
Dr Liz Stafford, April 2026. Copyright © 2026 Music Education Solutions Limited. All Rights Reserved.
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