By Gretchen Webster

WESTPORT — The world of post-punk and new wave rock took the stage Saturday at the Westport Library when Richard Butler, founder of the British band the Psychedelic Furs and a visual artist, and Chris Frantz, drummer for both Talking Heads and Tom Tom Club, met to talk about music, art and more.

The musicians were brought together for the Malloy Lecture in the Arts, funded by a donation from the late artist Susan Malloy and presented annually at the library since 2002. This year it was also part of VersoFest, a four-day music and arts festival held at the library.

The two reminisced about the music scene in the ’80s, and the process of writing and making music and its connection to visual art. 

Butler and Frantz first met in Boston in 1980 during the Psychedelic Furs’ initial American tour, and legendary music producer Steve Lillywhite, who spoke at the library earlier Saturday, worked with both men’s bands.

“It’s been a fantastic ride,” Butler said. “We’ve been our own bosses, kept our own hours, and are doing what we love.”

Butler loved painting and making images as a young man, he said, leaving art school to work in art galleries. It was around the same time that punk rock erupted on the music scene, and he began going to the shows of his favorite bands.

“I’d never seen anger and energy like that … I thought, ‘I could try that, I could do that.’ … It worked very well,’ ” he said to applause.

Frantz asked Butler about the connection between art and music, but the lyricist said he didn’t really see one.  “A lyricist is not a poet,” Butler said when asked if songwriting is akin to poetry.  “Bob Dylan and Elvis Costello wrote fantastic lyrics,” he said, “but they didn’t rise to the level of Yeats” or other poets.

His advice to young people intent on pursuing a career in an art or music is, “Follow what you love. Look at the things you love, and create your own.”

During their talk, images of Butler’s art works flashed on the screen above the two men, as well as photos of the Psychedelic Furs performing. The group, which released the album, “Made of Rain” in 2020, its first in 30 years, is touring the U.S. in April and May. 

In the intervening decades, Butler focused on painting. His art work, described in a library release as “dynamic compositions that are at once naturalistic and hallucinatory,” has been exhibited in galleries around the world.

Freelance writer Gretchen Webster, a Fairfield County journalist and journalism teacher for many years, was editor of the Fairfield Minuteman newspaper for 10 years and teaches journalism at Southern Connecticut State University.