Tag: art

Take Your Spotify Playlists to the Next Level With Custom Cover Art

At Spotify, we know our users like to flex their creativity. We’ve seen this come to life across the more than 8 billion playlists listeners have created to soundtrack their musical moods, milestones, and every moment in between. Now we’re giving music fans the power to design and customize their own playlist cover art so their playlists can always look as good as they sound.

Rolling out in beta on the Spotify mobile app today, the new feature offers both Free and Premium users the ability to create their own cover art with unique images, colors and text effects, graphic elements, and more, allowing them to make their music playlists more unique and personalized than ever before.

Creating cover art on Spotify

All you need is a mobile device to access and use this feature. Whether you’re on iOS or Android, head to the Spotify mobile app (make sure it’s up to date) and select a playlist that you personally created or create a new one.

  • Tap the three-dot menu on the playlist page and then select “Create cover art” within the menu options.
  • From there, you can upload an original photo of your own and add or update a variety of elements, including:
  • Once complete, your playlist will be updated with your new cover art, and you can share your creation directly with friends or on social media platforms.

Pro tip: You can only save one custom cover art per playlist at a time, and each new cover you create will override the previous one for that specific playlist. If you’d like to create multiple covers for a playlist, make a copy of the playlist first. The easiest way to do that is to open the playlist you wish to copy, tap the three-dot menu, select “Add to other playlist,” and then tap “New playlist” to create your copy.

With the feature currently available in beta to users in English in 65 markets, we’re excited for fans to personalize their music playlists like never before. We’ll keep innovating and expanding the tool, so stay tuned for what’s to come.

Get inspired by the experts

As part of the launch, we’ve partnered with music artists, visual creators, and artists behind some of the world’s most iconic album art to empower listeners to unlock a new level of creativity and individuality. Each used the new feature to create unique cover art for one of their playlists on Spotify.

Music artists include Clairo, Jamie xx, and Arlo Parks. On the visual creator front, we’ve tapped Pablo Rochat, Jesse Nyberg, Vita Kari, and Elliot Ulm. Finally, our album artwork experts include creative director Imogene Strauss; Adrian Hernandez, the creator of Ugly Primo and designer of Un Verano Sin Ti by Bad Bunny; and Cey Adams, who has designed albums and logos for The Notorious B.I.G., Beastie Boys, and JAY-Z.

Listen Like Basquiat: New Exhibit Helps Fans Discover the Musical Influences of the Famed Painter

Among the most celebrated American artists of all time, Jean-Michel Basquiat left an indelible mark on the world. His paintings combined his own unique style with powerful commentaries on race, politics, and culture. And although he died over 30 years ago, the impact of his legacy can be felt throughout art and culture to this day.

As such, a new exhibit, Jean-Michel Basquiat: King Pleasure celebrates the iconic artist’s life and work with more than 200 rare and never-before-seen paintings, drawings, and artifacts from the Basquiat family collection. There are so many works on display that it required a 15,000-square-foot space nestled in New York City’s crowded downtown. The expansive location was designed by David Adjaye, the renowned architect who also worked on the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History & Culture. 

As one of the exhibit sponsors, Spotify also helped curate an exclusive audio experience for visitors that offers further musical insights into the life of Jean-Michel.

Photo credit: Bella Newman

“I think the mission was really to provide a little more context to Jean-Michel’s life. There have been people who have spoken about Jean-Michel’s life before us, and they did so from the very narrow perspective of whatever time they spent with him,” Jean-Michel’s sister Lisane Basquiat shared with For the Record. “And so for us, it’s about sharing a perspective of Jean-Michel’s life that only his family could share. There’s really no one else that can tell this part of the story.”

 

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The music that shaped the artist

One of those perspectives emphasized through this exhibit is Jean-Michel’s connection to music and the way that it influenced his art. To hear it from his other sister, Jeanine Herriveaux, Jean-Michel’s love affair with music started at home during his childhood.

“We had a huge influence at home in terms of music. My father had a great stereo, and he played music from the moment that he either woke up in the morning on the weekend or when he came home from work. Music was playing until he went to bed. And the genres ranged from Latin music to jazz to Neil Diamond,” Jeanine revealed. “I know that had to have impacted Jean-Michel significantly. The reason I think that is because later on, he made many, many trips to Tower Records and purchased many, many albums. Music was very important to him.”

Listen Like Basquiat

The immersive Spotify-curated audio experience starts with the Listen Like Basquiat destination, which features a series of playlists packed full of the songs he loved, as well as music from artists he inspired. The playlists were curated with the help of the Basquiat sisters and correspond with different stages of Jean-Michel’s life: Childhood, Studio, Nightlife, and Legacy.