ROCKtober: When Music Becomes Something You Can See

By Kim Plyler, Owner of Arete Gallery

What does music look like?

Perhaps it is a bold brushstroke that carries the energy of a guitar solo. A curve in wood that feels like a melody. A photograph that holds the emotion of a moment long after the sound has faded.

This October, we are celebrating that connection at Arete Gallery with ROCKtober, a month dedicated to musicians and the creative world surrounding them. It is an invitation to discover what happens when the people we know through music tell their stories through color, texture, shape, and light.

For me, that is part of the joy of owning a gallery: watching someone encounter an artist’s work and discover a side of that person they never knew existed.

We often describe people by the art form that first brought them into our lives. A guitarist. A drummer. A producer. A photographer.

But creativity has a way of traveling beyond those descriptions.

Making music involves listening closely, recognizing patterns, building tension, and knowing when to leave space. Those same creative choices can find a home on a canvas, in a sculpture, or through a camera lens.

A painter considers how colors interact. A musician considers how sounds interact. A sculptor works with balance, weight, and form. A composer shapes movement through time. A photographer chooses the precise moment to preserve; a performer senses the moment to enter, pause, or let a note linger.

Each medium asks the artist to pay attention and then make a choice.

That does not mean every musician automatically becomes a painter. Each craft requires its own practice, patience, and willingness to begin again. Yet the curiosity that leads someone to create a song can also lead them toward a brush, a piece of wood, or a camera.

Sometimes a new medium offers a new way to express something they have carried for years.

During ROCKtober, Ron Aniello’s Sound into Color invites us to consider that creative connection.

Many people recognize Ron through his work as a music producer, including his work with Bruce Springsteen. At Arete Gallery, visitors can experience another expression of his imagination through his paintings.

Looking at visual art made by someone whose work you know through music creates an intriguing encounter. You may find yourself searching for rhythm in a composition, energy in a brushstroke, or a feeling you cannot quite put into words.

The painting offers its own experience. You bring your memories, your emotions, and your curiosity to it. A conversation begins.

ROCKtober also features Michael Cartellone, known to music audiences as the drummer for Lynyrd Skynyrd, whose fine art has attracted interest around the world. His work invites visitors to explore the visual imagination of an artist they may first have encountered onstage.

Steve Chrismar, formerly a guitarist for George Thorogood, brings another dimension to the celebration through his woodworking. Working with wood requires attention to grain, texture, and the possibilities within a material. There is something deeply compelling about an artist recognizing what a piece of wood might become and patiently bringing that vision into form.

We are also celebrating the artwork of Jerry Garcia, offering another opportunity to encounter a familiar musical name through visual expression.

Together, these works encourage us to look beyond the role that made an artist famous. They remind us that a creative life can hold many kinds of work, each revealing something different.

Photography adds another voice to ROCKtober through May Pang’s photographs of John Lennon.

A photograph can preserve a gesture, an expression, or a fleeting connection. It allows us to return to a moment and notice something we missed the first time. Images of a public figure can feel especially powerful when they reveal the person within a familiar face.

We are delighted to welcome May Pang back to Arete Gallery on Saturday, October 17, from 1–4 p.m. Her visit offers an opportunity to meet her, experience the photographs, and connect with the stories surrounding them.

What I love most about ROCKtober is the permission it offers all of us to explore.

You do not have to make a career out of every creative impulse. You can love music and begin taking photographs. You can write stories and experiment with clay. You can pick up a paintbrush simply because a color moves you.

There is value in being a beginner. In following a question. In making something with your hands and discovering how it changes the way you see.

At Arete Gallery, our belief in artists healing humanity begins with these moments of connection. Art gives us a place to pause, feel, remember, and meet one another through a shared experience.

This October, I invite you to visit us in New Hope, Pennsylvania, and celebrate ROCKtober. Explore the paintings, photographs, and woodworking. Spend time with a piece that catches your attention. Let yourself be surprised.

You may arrive knowing an artist’s music and leave with a new appreciation for their imagination.

And perhaps you will leave ready to follow a creative impulse of your own.

ROCKtober is on view at Arete Gallery throughout October 2026. Join us for May Pang’s special visit on October 17, from 1–4 p.m.