Ways of Hearing
Rosa de Vera
Ways of Hearing is a body of work that explores the parallels of graphic design and musical composition, where the act of designing becomes a way of “playing music” through visual language. By translating sound into static compositions that function like graphic scores, the project develops a new visual language for audio, exploring how design can reframe listening, and vice versa. How does visual art and music parallel one another as creative systems of composition, rhythm, and expression?
The publication presents this system in two parts—a manual and an exploration—outlining the design decisions, technical parameters, and research that informed its development. Musical properties are translated into visual form: instruments are represented by shapes, tone by color, and pitch by position within a grid. A curated selection of song compositions demonstrates how the system functions across different musical works.
Accompanying the publication is a generative web tool that allows users to create compositions and see the system unfold in real time. The grid structure extends throughout both the tool and the publication itself, emphasizing how rhythm, space, and harmony organize visual and musical compositions alike. Together, these components propose a new language for listening—one that reveals visual arts and music not as metaphor, but as shared methods of composition and creative expression.