Alessia Cara on Art, Music, and Duality with Google Arts & Culture

The Color Red and Synesthesia

• 🎨 Deep reds are central to Alessia Cara's new album "Love & Hyperbole" because the sentiments of love and hyperbole feel inherently deep and dark.
• 🌈 Cara experiences synesthesia, associating colors with words and sounds, which influences her artistic universe-building for each album.
• 💡 She notes the connection between her synesthesia and artists like Wassily Kandinsky, who also experienced color hearing.

Frida Kahlo's Influence

• 🌺 Alessia Cara has long admired Frida Kahlo for her striking image, strength, and ability to express deep pain and vulnerability simultaneously in her art.
• ✈️ A life-changing trip to Kahlo's home in Mexico in 2018 deeply impacted Cara, especially realizing the parallel between Kahlo's self-portraits and her own album cover where she is holding her own hand.
• 🖼️ Kahlo's use of herself as inspiration is seen as a powerful act, which Cara feels she may have subconsciously channeled.

Musical Inspirations: Sinatra and Winehouse

• 🎤 Amy Winehouse is a significant inspiration for Cara due to her raw honesty and openness about pain and mistakes, serving as a compass for authentic songwriting.
• 🎶 Frank Sinatra's legendary voice and his ability to sing about love in a beautiful and sweet way inspired Cara to explore positive romantic themes on her new album, contrasting with her previous work.
• 🔄 The influence is a