Which has had the greatest influence on you; music, painting or literature?

That’s a tough one to answer as they all have and do play a meaningful part in my life but I guess if I had to pick one, it would be literature. Fiction has been my companion and consolation since I was a child..

Music. I can hear a song from my teen or younger years and it can take me to that time instantly.

Music, by far.

This may be sacrilege, as I’m a visual artist, but music first. Not only is it nostalgic and transportive (as @chyna mentioned), but it helped me with language growing up and has served as inspiration for my own art.

Speaking of which, I would expand “painting” to all of visual art (sculpture, drawing, etchings, even architecture) — which is second for me. Then literature.

literature. When I was 15 when I got my first library card. I read the Dragon lance series and Forgotten Realms books. It changed my life for hopefully the better.

It’s a tough toss-up between literature and music, but I’d have to say music wins out.

I’d have to say literature and then music, but it’s so close I’m splitting hairs.

May I add photography?

Well, it’s actually complicated. At early age I was exposed to literature. But what I was in contact with more was actually cartoons and comics. For starter, I was a kid, so visual presentation was much easier to digest. And beside, I just had that ability to pick up things in those things, from story telling to art. You can say my ability to draw was largely developed from this phase.

And one point I read a lot of books, in part of an attempt to improve my English. I had a chance to access to several books from classic to contemporary. Literature became the second influence.

Then I started to have less time, and literature started to lose its influence. I began to look for a different form of entertainment that fitted my time limit. And that was when I found movies. Now movies are the ones that play the major role.

So, currently I think I can rank movies as the first, then painting if you count comics as a kind of painting, the literature. Music doesn’t have that much role as far as I remember.

It’s literature for me without a doubt and online media nowadays..)

Music, most likely.
Dad was a high school music teacher with a Master’s degree in Drama and Art. He wrote a musical play for his thesis and wrote all of the music that went with it, too.
Mom played the piano at home, the organ in many churches we attended.
Older brother played bass guitar, lead/rhythm guitar and trumpet and French horn.
Dad also painted some, in several media forms, and Mom dabbled artistically a smidge.
But literature was always bandied about in some fashion, so it is not without mention.

Definitely music for me. I was exposed to it at an early age, not only listening, singing was a family activity.

Other forms, I learned to appreciate as I grew older.

Music because it’s always there, whether I’m reading or not. In fact, it’s difficult to express this, but the things I tead wind up sort of catalogued musically in my head.

musicX1,000 !
I could live without the others if I had to, but not music. I am a singer, so there’s that. I also do musical theater. It is my life blood. I love to go to see live music, it’s what most of my “extra’ money is spent on. And just music in general makes my world go round.

And also as @chyna said…music is basically a time machine for me, and I love it.

Music.

As a pre teen wannabe rebel I drew spectacles, testicles wallet & watch over characters in my children’s bible while listening to the Sex Pistols…so yeah, I dunno.

Hello @zenzen ! Missed you!

Hi yourself @chyna… nice to see you!

Where’ve you been @zenzen?

Music

I’ve been thinking about this since I asked the question and while literature has always been important to me I think music, though I don’t play or sing, has been closer to my heart.

Literature wins easily. I like to look at good paintings, but I spend much more time reading. The only music I have heard for some time is soundtracks on movies and TV shows. Some of them are so annoying that I push the Mute button and just use captions. Music is definitely last on this list for me.