Good things to eat, ART, friends

I know you would like to see some of the delicious food, desserts let's be honest, that people have given us.

A few of the leftover cookies our friends brought for dinner.

Cake our neighbor made, almond cookies and crispini that we brought.

Two kinds of Castelvecchio art:

Mine

Public

Friends on piazza

Us having fun

Intradaqua

Today started of as usual with first and second breakfast. Jim now has the young woman who works at Al’Kafhe to ask if he wants, “the usual”. I believe she thinks we are funny, but who knows. Then we went painting and you will get to see that work tomorrow.

 Our friend Victorio now has a second job at the commune in Intradaqua. He works there three afternoons a week. Today we went with him as well as his wife, Ermlinda. Intradaqua is a beautiful town within site of Sulmona. From looking at the map, I thought it was much more isolated. The intersuburbana buses run to and fro. There is a spectacular Torre d Midevale and the town is beautiful with much more going on than our little town. We were only there a couple of hours and it takes some time to drink a coffee and hang out and go in the church and walk up to the Torre.

My friend, Ermilinda

Note the weight of those rocks. They are holding the crane.

An Intradaqua small thing

The most exciting part is that we met a woman from New Zealand who comes to Introdaqua in the summer. She is an artist and has a little art shop where she is selling art from Abruzzo. I am going to email her some of my paintings the minute I post this. She was a super nice person and it would be fun to have someone to do something with.

Soon we will be having dinner. If you don’t wish you were here, you should!

Il nostra casa.

Rain

Yesterday it rained some. Poured actually, but today it double plus poured for at least an hour with non-stop thunder. About one hour later we could see a wall of water headed our way from Secenaro perpendicular to the valley and then it rained some more. The streets are very clean and I am wearing my sweatshirt and jeans. It is warmer in Denmark than here. I like it, but the Italians say, "Bruta". That means terrible weather. They will probably be saying they did not have a summer, but I like it fine.

We went painting this morning, even though it looked threatening. We walked in the house minutes before the first downpour. We were really lucky.

This is what I got done today. It is on white, colorfix supertooth board. I never felt any need to spray it in 1.5 - 2 hours. The white covered completely and it was perfect for a landscape. I don't think I would have liked it so much for the buildings here as the spray helps get the texture. I am going to fix the little cat ears at the bottom of the page and I feel like the color right behind them isn't working either.

I have spent the rest of the day doing watercolor portraits. I am getting a little tired of the stress.
I did one of this guy and now he is bringing everyone to me to get their picture taken. I don't know any details about an alleged show, but I sure would like to show them before I give them all away.

 

Here is Jim painting this morning. I will take a picture of his tomorrow. 

These are some encouraging signs of progress in our town. 

Here they have replaced all the pavers. This was a big hole under the arch that virtually during the earthquake. They are still skrying sand, but I thought it looked imposible to get those pavers back in.
 

In this photo you can see how much is under construction and how much of the tower of San Francesco has been uncovered. They build this amazing scaffolding and then cover it with mesh so no stones or mortar can fall out of it.

I might have forgotten to post the finished picture of this painting or maybe not, but here it is. 

I can't really remember the details, but I think it is the gray Wallis paper that I had from last year.

And last of all for today: the coffee place with Salvatore standing outside. There is no more Ben & Jerry's sign.

Daily Life

Its been a weird couple of days. I don’t really know what I have been up to. I blame it all on the book, “The Goldfinch”. I just want to finish it. My recommendation is, do not read it. I don’t care how great everyone says it is. If you have ever thought you were the least bit crazy this book will send you screaming over the edge. So far nothing good has happened. I can only imagine it is about to get worse. I can’t read it at night because it gives me nightmares. “The Goldfinch” by Fabritius is one of my favorite paintings in the world for as long as I can remember. The more you love the painting, the more you will hate the book.

So be warned, it is not a book to take to the beach.

In the meantime I framed a few paintings today and we did get out to paint, even though it was pretty cloudy and I finished my alley way painting and drew in another crazy angled one. I am looking straight up at some buildings I had never seen because I was too busy watching my footing. Maybe we are having a exhibition, maybe not, we are relaxed and not worried.

Finished

started

Our neighbors came for dinner last night. We had been planning this meal all winter and even brought tacos from homw. They liked the Mexican food, especially the salsa. Salvatore cannot say watermelon. He says, "watchmelone". I laughed my head off. When I think of all the Italian words that turn to mush in my mouth it felt good to know that I can actually speak one language.

Our neighbors

Our Danish friends from Gagliano return from their new home in Puglio to visit till the end of August. They are coming over for onion rings. (that is what everyone asks for) We are going with Victorio to Introdaqua on Monday. A town on the road to no where that I have always wanted to see. I don’t know why Victorio is going, but I bummed the chance for James, rhymes with the jamas in pajamas, and me to go with him. It is acutally possible that I or rather we have been there and just didn't know it, but if it is that town it is really beautiful and I am going to take my painting stuff.

August 2 is a day of non-stop religious activities revolving around San Francesco, August 3 is the 100 year anniversary of WW1, starting or ending I am not sure. Italian flags are hung everywhere. August 6 our friend comes to visit. August 7 & 8 is grain events yet to be determined. So things are heating up. It has been a very slow year here entertainment wise. There was only one band at al’Kafhe and when it is supposed to start at 10 and starts at 11 that is pretty late. Jim went, but I had been out painting all day and was too tired. The market has been very small, but maybe that is because the road to Reanno is closed? It will open for a few weeks while the workmen are on holiday.

After many requests, Jim finally did a drawing of the fountain. And now we are going for a walk before it rains again. Ciao!

Threat of rain fulfilled

Luckily I went out to paint at 8am and finished one landscape and started another before a few drops of rain sent me scurrying for home. I was quite a distance out in the fields on the road to Gagliano so I did not want to take a chance. For the first time all summer I took some sequential photos and here they are. The other accomplishment of this day was mailing a package to Flaminia's family. It only took two summers to get it done. It turns out 1pm is the perfect time to go to the post office. We were the only ones there. You could tell it had been a long time since anyone had mailed a package. It took two people. We also picked up a catalog of post office merchandise. So fun and two pieces of junk mail!

View

Drawing, if you can't lie about it you might as well be a photographer

First lay-in

Second Lay-in

Brightening things up

Working hard on getting colors correct

Texture and variety added and Finito!

Second pastel before the clouds overran me.

Jim's Watercolor and pastel pencil drawings

These are most of the paintings Jim has done this summer. I wasn't sure what I had posted so I am doing them all.

Palace CVS

Blue Door CVS

Above Piazza Linda, CVS

Church of San Elizabeta, CVS

Up from little piazza, CVS

Street up to market, CVS

Mayor's house under the bridge, CVS

Doorways CVS

Church of San Francesco, CVS

Up from Piazza Linda, CVS

CVS

CVS

CVS

Looking down at piazza Linda, CVS