Art and music together can be powerful, intoxicating and emotionally evocative.  Alex Booze, a 22-year-old senior studio art major at Sacramento State, creates his artwork with music in mind.

Booze is from Folsom and has lived in the Sacramento area all his life. He said he started his art as realism, but has created this disparate way of drawing with lines. He first started with straight lines, which developed into more organic lines.

His expansion to organic lines emulates the sounds of music he listens to Booze said. These organic lines vary from flowing to imitating jagged wavelengths of sound. His message within his artwork is for people to endure sound and music through it.

“It’s about having people experience sound and view sound as they previously didn’t see it,” Booze said. “They’ll open their eyes to a different way of looking at sound.”

When Booze is working on his drawings, he mostly uses ink with permanent markers, or even pastels. He also uses his craft with digital art.

Booze said his creative process begins in different ways.

“Sometimes I work with ideas before I start, or just go in and start drawing,” Booze said.  “I’ll draw inspiration from music or mundane sounds such as ocean ripples, rain and air – that kind of thing.”

Booze said he has greatly evolved from his earlier days of drawing.

“I never did anything like this before I came to Sacramento State,” Booze said. “This is the second year I have been doing this specific kind of artwork. If you looked at when I first started this, and what I’m doing right now, you would say they were drawn by two different people.”

Booze has his first solo exhibit, “New Wave,” through Friday. A reception was held Monday in the R.W. Witt Gallery.

The “New Wave” exhibit displays at least 20 pieces of Booze’s drawings and has his digital artwork projected onto a wall which shuffles through his work.

Booze has worked closely with associate professors Rachel Clarke, Sarah Flohr and Robert Ortbal during his time at Sac State.

“The entire art faculty is really great. Every art class I have taken here has always been a moving experience for me,” Booze said.

Ortbal said he has seen Booze grow through his art.

“(He has gone) from more academic types of solutions to problems to more personal and evocative,” Ortbal said. “(His art is) emotionally charged. He is now working with pieces that involve giving visual form to music.”

Clarke has also been a witness to Booze’s art processes. She said she has observed how he integrates traditional and digital media to create a seamless work of art.

“It doesn’t matter what medium he works with – he brings this style that he has and his own concept (to it),” Clarke said.

Ortbal has high hopes for Booze and what will come for him in the future.

“He shows a lot of promise,” Ortbal said. “He is always very punctual, which artists get a bad rap that they are not that way, but I think the best ones are. He is very thorough and thoughtful and he commits a lot of time to his work.”

Booze said he has been looking forward to his first solo exhibit.

“After all the classes I’ve taken, it will be relaxing to put up all the work and reflect on all the work I’ve done over these past semesters,” Booze said. “I’m not stressed out; if anything, I’m happy to have a little space of my own for a certain amount of time to show my work.”

Alex Booze’s exhibit, “New Wave,” will be in the Witt Gallery in Kadema Hall until Friday.

Courtney Owen can be reached at [email protected].