Boulanger was immersed in music at an early age, and it is no surprise that this influence permeated her artwork throughout her artistic career. Her mother, a concert pianist, encouraged her love of music and by the age of 15 she gave her first piano recital before she left to study music and visual arts at the National Conservatory of Music and the Academy of Art in Santiago, Chile. “Musicien Jaune” is one of many examples of Boulanger blending her recurring theme of children and her love of music to convey the feeling and mood in this portrait. Her use of yellow may suggest that perhaps the horn player is like the horn he is playing with its brassy crisp tones. The young boy in the painting stands rigid and composed, and even though he is still a child there is a seriousness in his face as though she has frozen him in the instance right before he sits to play his concert.
