On Thursday, trumpeter Nicholas Payton will celebrate the influence of bebop greats Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker on the paintings of Jean-Michel Basquiat at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
Payton, a New Orleans native who still resides there, had just returned from a few shows in Brazil when he learned about the parameters of the gig. He’s not familiar with Basquiat works at the museum, but he has been profoundly influenced by visual art in recent years.
“When you play what you see,” he says, “it comes from a different place than when you play based on what you hear. My last two records have been very visual — I’m dealing with colors rather than notes, treating harmony as a color. My music is more rhythmic, more effervescent. There are lines and circles.”
It sounds tailor-made for Basquiat, whose work in his short lifetime was defined by its lines, energy and color – and its kinship with jazz. Payton, who made his first solo album in 1994 and last year gave some impressive performances in support of his “Into the Blue,” album, talked about Picasso, politics and potential.
Even before I was able to get out a full question, Payton chimed in with thoughts on art and how musicians have channeled art as an inspiration.
“You have trick yourself to not be so theoretical, tap ways to get to other places. It’s cool to be in that environment — playing to what you’re seeing.”
The  Q&A is after the jump.

Dean & Britta have composed a baker's dozen songs for a project that focuses on Andy Warhol's  "screen tests," in which individuals were seated in front of a camera for four minutes and filmed in silent portraiture.
“13 Most Beautiful … Songs for Andy Warhol’s Screen Tests” will debut in Pittsburgh as part of the Pittsburgh International Festival of Firsts on Oct. 24 and 25. Warhol was a native of Pittsburgh.
Project will use the screen tests of Lou Reed, Richard Rheem, Dennis Hopper, Nico, Edie Sedgwick, Susan Bottomly and seven others.
The four-minute, silent film portraits will be shown via large scale video projection with the musicians performing live on stage.
Warhol shot approximately 500 "screen tests" between  1963 and 1966. The subjects — both famous and anonymous — were visitors to his studio, the Factory. They were asked to pose, lit with a strong keylight, and filmed by Warhol with his stationary 16mm Bolex camera on silent, black and white, 100-foot rolls of film.  Each screen test lasted only as long as the roll of film. The films were projected in slow motion so that each lasted four minutes. 
The screen tests were also used, as were other Warhol films, as part of the light show for his 1966 Exploding Plastic Inevitable shows that featured the Velvet Underground and Nico.

One of the most impressive elements of the last Underworld show I reviewed was the images beamed behind Darren Emerson, Karl Hyde and Rick Smith. When most of the time is spent staring at your shoes or watching men twist knobs, the art was the most riveting visual aspect of the concert.
In the weeks preceding and following the All Points West Music and Arts Festival, the ArtJam of Underworld; A Multi Media Exhibition will be on display at New York's Jacobson Howard Gallery (33. E. 68th St.)
Running Aug. 1-15, the Jacobson Howard Gallery installation will be a multi-media installation of video, sound, sculpture,drawing, painting, photography and text/writing. The space will be in constant flux with work being created on site, positioned, repositioned, altered, removed and then replaced and reconfigured once more. Forages into the city to gather material will also be made, brought back to the space and reconfigured.
Artist Robert Morris calls artjam "a continuous project altered daily" that has been an ongoing conversation between Smith, Hyde and John Warwicker of tomato.
The most recent installation at the Makuhari Messe in Tokyo formed part of the space for an Underworld concert, the Oblivion Ball. The ArtJam took the form of a live painting performance on a 130-foot long wall that was 30 feet high.

Bob Dylan, who rarely talks about his music, sits down for a chat about his art and  politics with the Times of London in advance of an exhibition of his art .
The writer uses a little too much ink explaining his state of mind at the interview,  but draws out some meaningful quotes from the generally cryptic Dylan.
On his  art education: “I was in my teens before I started to see books of paintings in the school library - frescoes or the work of Michelangelo, that kind of thing. And I didn't really see the stuff that properly had an impact on me - Matisse, Derain, Monet, Gauguin - till later on, when I was in my twenties.”
On his style:  “I don't have that facility to copy note for note. Influenced by? If I had the ability to paint like any of those guys I might see the similarity, but I don't. If there is anything it's just by accident and instinctive.”
On American politics: “Well, you know right now America is in a state of upheaval. Poverty is demoralizing. You can't expect people to have the virtue of purity when they are poor. But we've got this guy out there now who is redefining the nature of politics from the ground up ... Barack Obama. He's redefining what a politician is, so we'll have to see how things play out. Am I hopeful? Yes, I'm hopeful that things might change. Some things are going to have to.”

When eBay first launched, I saw it as a golden opportunity to secure vintage - and most likely bootleg - concert posters from San Francisco's psychedelic days at the Fillmore, Winterland and the Avalon. I am hardly alone.
Wolfgang's Vault has capitalized on the enduring appeal of the material, however dicey their intellectual property rights may be. Rhino Entertainment, on the other hand, is going the high-art route, launching a line of 18 limited-edition remastered lithographs of Family Dog Presents posters.
Rhino has acquired the copyrights and logos to all graphic works created by the Family Dog Presents, signing a deal with the estate of Family Dog founder Chet Helms.
The 18 lithographs are some  of the most recognizable Family Dog posters, including shows by the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, The Doors, Quicksilver Messenger Service, and Big Brother and the Holding Company. Signed and numbered, the lithographs will be produced in cooperation with the  creators and will be sold at Jack Gallery locations.
Artists Stanley Mouse, Alton Kelley, Wes Wilson and Victor Moscoso will attend a launch event June 18 at the Jack Gallery located at L.A.'s the Grove.
Family Dog was created Helms, who moved to SF from Texas with Janis Joplin and became manager of Big Brother and the Holding Company. Beginning in 1966, he organized a series of weekly dance hall revues at the Avalon Ballroom, which became the premier venue for psychedelic happenings.