The Art in “The Bird that Sang in Color”

This is the final drawing in my series on the artwork that inspired The Bird that Sang in Color. The words on this drawing are lyrics from a song by Robin Williamson of The Incredible String Band. This pictures is mentioned during chapter four

The Bird that Sang in Color is filled with music! This post includes a few of the albums from the novel. The story opens in 1970 with Donna and Vincent listening to Let it Be by the Beatles.  While Vincent is sad that this is the band’s

Throughout The Bird that Sang in Color, Donna encourages her brother, Vincent to live by society’s conventions. She assumes that because he is single, childless, and works mostly menial jobs, he can’t possibly be happy. She fails to

When Donna first sees this picture, she wonders if this is how her brother, Vincent, envisioned his future self as an old philosopher-type or if it was the old philosopher who always lived inside of him, always trying to figure out “what

In the fourth chapter of The Bird that Sang in Color, Vincent tells Donna and Frank that the harp is the only instrument he still needs to learn. He reiterates this aspiration again in Chapter Eight. By Chapter Nine, he’s learned this

The picture above comes from the actual sketchbook that inspired me to write my novel, The Bird That Sang in Color. In fact, all of the drawings I’ve been featuring in this latest blog series come from this same sketchbook. This drawing

Although Vincent played a variety of instruments, his favorite was the guitar. When Donna sees this picture, she thinks of all the times he played the guitar for her and remembers him saying his favorite phrase, “I’ve been

The drawing of Vincent during his short time in a seminary shows him looking out like he’d rather be anywhere else. As in all his pictures, Donna is amazed at how he was able to convey such feeling and emotion with a few strokes of a

The theme of music pervades The Bird that Sang in Color.  The story begins and ends in music and music is played throughout with various instruments and albums. But there isn’t only music in a literal sense. There is also the music of

Vincent’s sketchbook was a sort of pictorial autobiography with drawings conveying the simple, but rich life he led. During much of his lifetime, Donna encouraged him to do more in terms of pursuing a career but he chose to live life on