THIS IS WHAT LISTENING LOOKS LIKE
Jessie Farnsworth (b. 2002, Nottingham) creates paintings shaped by her sensory experiences, internal dialogue, and emotional responses to sound.
This is a personal reflection on what listening feels like for her and how that feeling becomes visual.
Written & Published on 11/06/2025
“How can it be too loud if you're hard of hearing?”
That’s something I’ve heard a lot - including from myself.
The thing is, I don’t just hear sounds one at a time. I pick up everything at once, like a tangled ball of noise. Even if the volume’s low, or parts of it don’t even register properly, it can still be completely overwhelming.
My disabilities show up in my art - not in a ‘this song needs a chorus’ kind of way, but more like the bass in a track. You might not notice it immediately, but if it wasn’t there, you’d feel the difference.
I didn’t really accept that I was disabled for a long time. Mostly because I didn’t even know until 2021. I was always told I was too loud and too much. I figured that was just because of the hearing loss I already knew I had.
When I finally got diagnosed, I’d explain things away - “Oh, I’m just loud because I’m hard of hearing.” But that wasn’t the full story.
A lot of it was my neurodiversity - how my brain works, how I express myself. I’m not too much, I just really like specific things and hyperfixate and quite frankly become obsessed (right now it’s how many songs Pharrell Williams has produced and yes, this music has definitely influenced my recent works and thinking patterns).
Maybe you think I’m over the top when I cry because a song is just that good. But maybe you’re not listening enough (ironic I know).
I rely on music like it’s oxygen. Every lyric, every beat, every string pluck - it all influences my painting. I move and dance while I paint, and yeah, I’m clumsy. Sometimes it messes things up. But I work with it.
That’s kind of a theme in my life: working with what happens, not against it. I’ve accidentally rubbed off wall paint while ‘deep cleaning’ or made a stain worse trying to fix it. But I’ll figure it out.
I hope when you look at my paintings, your eyes jump around - colour, shape, line, colour again, and then maybe, what the fuck is this?
That’s how my brain feels most of the time. I can’t walk from A to B in peace - though music helps. Honestly, I usually can’t even remember how I got from A to B. I thought my way there.
I’m a disabled artist, but I don’t really think about my disabilities while I’m making work. They’re in there, they show up, whether I plan it or not, but they’re not something I consciously focus on during the process. It’s like background noise: the faint, tinny buzzing in my left ear, or the sound of someone’s fingers tapping a desk nearby. Always there, not always front and centre.