Wednesday, November 20, 2013

and more...

I am still having issues with this blog...but I want to get more of these images up, so I will continue this way. Perhaps those who run Blogspot will notice, though probably not, and fix things...so on we go:


This was an early work when I was still in undisciplined mode...it's called 'off to market', and I love the light moving around and reflecting off unseen walls. Dawn in Vaison la Romaine was amazingly beautiful, with the sun coming up over the mountains in the east, and people walking down through the hill town to the markets in the valley. I was still searching for the periwinkle blue in the shutters, which I didn't find until I got home and could use white again!

This process is too tiresome...I shall wait until tomorrow to do more...


more workshop works...

Les Buies des Barronnies

Les Buies is a village near Vaison la Romaine, named for its 'buies', or arches built under the town houses you see above. The houses are incredibly colorful,and even in October, after the grape harvest, there were still people in some of the homes. It rained while we were there, and so many of us painted under the arches, but I fell in love with the roof lines and colors.

I will try another image?!?

Nope...

Workshop works...

The luxury of a painting workshop is that all things are taken care of except what you put on your paper, or canvas. I have never allowed myself the luxury of a workshop until my neighbor, Tony van Hasselt - noted watercolorist, announced that he was leading one to Vaison la Romaine in Provence last October. And so I went, and had a wonderful time...here are some more works:
La Potterie, Brantes

This little pottery makes lovely china, which Tony and Jan have in their home in East Boothbay.

(Blogspot seems not to be allowing me to add more than one image per blog at the moment, so I will add more work in the next blog.)


Wednesday, November 13, 2013

June- JUly BRAF show: Boats, Boats and more boats...

The Boothbay Region Art Foundation early summer show begins for Windjammer Days: June 25th and 26th this year...so I am putting in boat paintings, though they are more or less illustration/ sketches of boats and the Harbor. Here they are:
'Oliver C. Weyant'
at Hodgdon's dock in East Boothbay


'Sumurun'
one of the big boats in the Shipyard Cup each year

'Cosy Harbor'
on Southport overlooking the Sheepscot River

'Cross Purposes'
at the mouth of Linekin Bay

It's been too long, I know...

but it's been a busy, travelling fall. I went with a painting group led and taught by Tony van Hasselt, a neighbor here in East Boothbay, to Vaison la Romaine, a small town in the mountains of Provence near Avignon. I spent 12 days without worrying about the lawn getting mowed, the boats bailed, the gardens weeded,or the groceries laid in - only about what was going down on my paper! And then I went to Paris and London!
This is my favorite, i.e. most finished, painting from Provence. It is currently in the Boothbay Region Art Foundation's Plein Air Show. In the tiny hill village of Brantes, population 65, we all painted for 2 days. You can see Tony painting down the road to the bottom right of the image. And because Tony kept after me saying, "no black holes in the middle of the painting," there's a ghostly friar in the doorway of the tiny chapel, where every Christmas the entire town parades up the hill and celebrates.
Then there is this little painting of the view from my bedroom window, which I painted for the lovely friends who drove me to Portland when I left, and picked me up when I returned nearly 3 weeks later. The periwinkle color of the shutters at the far end of the street is extremely hard to find in watercolor without using white, which I finally did use. And there were grape vines everywhere, as you can see!
We stayed in a lovely inn called Hostellerie le Beffroi, le beffroi being a belltower, which in this case was over the old medieval gate to the village below the castle on top of the hill. We had to walk up the hill and into the Inn everytime we left. I have several views of le beffroi, and will post one as soon as one is finished to my liking.

After 12 days of joyous work, I left Vaison with one of the other painters, hopped on the TGV in Avignon and arrived in Paris in the mid-afternoon. I walked and talked and ate at the Cafe Constant on rue San Dominique with my friend Mme. Emily Donahue that evening, and did more of the same the next day. I spent the evening with Unesco friends, and the next day spent the whole day at the Grand Palais, in two exhibitions. The first was smaller, a retrospective of Felix Valloton, an Impressionist-era painter, who wasn't really an Impressionist. My favorite work of his is below:
 Many of the works were photographable, though not theoretically this one, and I was chastised by a guard for taking this. But it's not as if you can confiscate film from a digital camera, now can you?
The other, and the major exhibition in the Palais was FIAC Paris, one of the giant art shows proliferating around the world, led by ArtBasel and ArtMiami. FIAC is when all the biggest and 'best' galleries in Europe bring their artists' best work to show off to all the other galleries and to the hordes of collectors and spectators like me. I have not had time to sort many images out, so they'll have to wait...
After Paris, I went to London to visit my niece, the Rev Dr. Jennifer Smith and her husband, Keith Riglin, an Anglican priest. We spent quite a while looking for Alastair Cooke in Westminster Abbey, only to discover later that he was spread in Central Park, not laid down in the Abbey where his Memorial was. Afterwards, we went to Whole Foods in London, by far the biggest one I have ever been in, and quite fun. It's in Kensington, near Harrods. I felt a little like I did when I headed straight for the Starbucks located at the foot on the Great Wall of China - a wee bit guilty, and a wee bit relieved to find something familiar there! Here's Jen and me in Whole Foods, looking kind of pleased:

Well, sorry, my blogspot seems to be refusing any more images...I shall have to end this now, and do more soon. Somehow I picked up a terrible cold in London, and spent the first week home, recovering. And now I'm trying madly to catch up with myself...More soon!