Disastrous painting day

No I did not faint of fall down the stairs, but I was not very happy. I wanted you to see how many stairs I have to conquer to get to my painting spot.

After an uphill slope here are the first stairs. 

Made it to the first landing.

Some more stairs

Level ground and then more stairs.

You guessed it! More stairs.

It is a long way.

Getting close!

Last set of stairs.

Painting spot with stairs in the picture. 

Here is the piazza where I am sitting right now.

Someone asked me what I meant by " the church is unwrapped." First the scaffolding goes up and then it is all wrapped so nothing can fall on anyone.  This work took two full days.

Lots to Do, June 28 & 29

This is from a few days ago, but I finally took a picture.

Yesterday we caught up with the other Vermonters in the valley. It was so great to hang out, go to the vineyard and to Brico Point…a teeny, tiny, home depot. It is about the size of Aubuchon’s downtown, but with a second floor of home furnishings. I got a teeny, tiny stool to put 1/2 of my pastels on so I only have to bend over 1/2 of the time and a large watercolor brush so I do not have to paint the background with the one hair brush.

I did get to work on an afternoon painting and then we had FOUR people over for wine and dessert. The Vermonters brought the wine and we were able to put a dent in our abundance of sweet things. They did not eat one apricot. (I have had 4 today, along with 1/2 an orange, grapes, cherries and a large piece of watermelon. What can I do? All the amaretti are gone.) 

Today I felt effervescent from the time I woke up. The sky was dark blue and the humidity was low. Sometimes when I am walking up to painting spot it reminds me of summer camp in Oklahoma. The air is so dry and you can smell the plants and the dust as you walk. Also, the large amounts of scary bugs are the same. I started a new painting this morning, took a photo of the next painting I want to do and drew it at home. 

Yes, there are still amusing T-shirts.

And amazing small things. This shutter holder is about 2 inches tall.

We went to see our friend at the Commune and our neighbor was there as well. By good fortune we were able to finish the letter about the water damage in our houses. It turns out that the next neighbor down from us also has damage. Salvatore and I had taken pictures of the water full of concrete dust coming down from the new construction and I feel like the mayor really understood how bad it was. Then I came home and organized my three pastel boxes. I had totally forgotten how many pastels I have here and then I brought some more. I worked on one of the portraits a tiny bit trying to make it a teeny bit better after some input from a mutual friend. 

At 4pm I went back to my painting spot from yesterday and finished that picture and then went to my spot from a couple of days ago and finished that one. It is not really a lot of hours of painting, but it is quite the climb to the top of CVS. In the shade it is pleasant, but in the sun it is a little tiring. 

Jim did two really nice drawings today. He brings them home, adds watercolor and then goes back to the spot and uses pastel pencils. The drawings look really great!

I spent some time sitting around with my first friends in Castelvecchio: Linda and Olga. They were upset about something, but I am not sure what. I just kept saying, “I’m sorry”.  Linda's husband, my friend, Amalfio die in the fall. We are all missing him. 

Amalfio

A Day With Nothing to Do

First of all it was not too hot. The sky was overcast, the air was soft and there was a pleasant wind. After 2nd breakfast, we walked around up in the top of Castelvecchio looking for some different places to paint. I took lots of photos and divided them into a “Morning”  and an “Afternoon” album on my computer. (pure genius). 

In the Afternoon

New Vistas

The earthquake zone is getting increasingly overgrown and desolate.

The portrait situation is so out of control. You may have heard me say, “if I had to be a portrait painter I would die!” I guess I am dead. I am afraid every time someone unexpected comes up to talk to me. “You took my photo two years ago? Where is my portrait?” “You took my photo 10 years ago? Where is my portrait? “ “These are my three friends from Roma, please paint their portraits.” “Here is my phone number. Call me when it is finished!”  Ok everyone is super nice about this, but it is embarrassing to be reminded when you have zero memory of something and it is just a little bit of pressure. I have three portraits done so far and the two of kids are really bugging me. I wish I would say, “no more kids!!” They are just too hard. I said something brilliant yesterday when I was taking a photo of someone I actually WANT to paint, “the life is in the face.” Kids just don’t have enough life yet for it to show in their faces. Mama mia.  Currently I am painting a nun from Rome who does a TV show with the Pope for Italians living outside of Italy. Next, I will probably be painting the Pope himself. Right? He would like a modest little watercolor of himself. Not some giant oil painting with cherubs and stuff flying around. 

While walking back from our painting recognizance mission, we walked by our neighbor’s garden. We both have water problems from a blocked drain up above our houses. When it rains water runs down a large hill and into our ceilings. Because it is all stone, it doesn’t destroy the ceiling, but it makes it humid and musty in the house…honestly, we don’t notice it, but the neighbors do because they are used to it being so dry. Our ceiling is in tatters and the wall that I repainted after last years water damage is covered in that fresco blume and the paint is falling off. This is the third time I have painted over this wall and I will not be doing it again. Anyway, the neighbor, Jim and I went to see the major and Salvatore talked to him for quite a while. I nodded and Jim looked attentive. Salvatore laid out the whole problem and the mayor said we should write a letter. It does not sound too promising. Next Salvatore took us to see his other garden. This is the BIG garden out in the country. It was so beautiful and we got to meet his dogs. He said that we would come there and have arrostichinis. We said, “SI”. We said, “Si” many times, very loudly. 

The Country Garden

LaLa

Salvatore and LaLa

Finally we went home and took a tour of the water problem back to its source. I took many pictures to put into evidence. There is a big change and I know this is true, because I have painted up in the areas where the water is coming from and it is clearly different now than before. Sending a letter to Rome about the problem seems a little like sending a letter to D.C. about our septic system in Vermont. We shall see! 

After all that I worked on the portrait of the nun, when out to my newly identified landscape site and then it was on to the piazza and bar Komodo to watch Italy play Spain in the European Cup. Pretty exciting because we had rosemary potato chips, prosecco ,(.80c a glass) and Italy WON!! It was a really good game with Italy dominating. 

I do really like this idea of taking photos of the places I think I would like to paint, coming back to our house, thinking and looking at them, figuring out the best composition, and doing the drawing at home. It is so much easier to go out and get started painting when the drawing is done. I did have the one bad experience where the painting was a fail because of the drawing, but today went really well. I have to go back and work on it again, but mostly it is because it is so hot and I get too tried to work on the little finishing things.

So for a day with nothing to do, it was pretty busy. Adventures always come our way! I am pretty proud of my Italian in-spite of complaints by other, native, speakers. Brava Jeneane or Giovanna! Brava!

Last good  news of the day:  Italy beats Spain and Iceland beats Exit-land. We'll teach you to leave the E.U. 

Painting, Wedding, Pilgrams, Vespa Festa!

Vespa Festa!!

It is 6am and I am sitting on the terrace. The pink light of sunrise is climbing down the face of the Sirentes. The little dog who lives by the fountain is mercifully silent after having barked itself into exhaustion over night. The mountains are still purple, but their mystery was solved when we drove up to Rocca Di Mese with Moose and Domi: the trees only have buds, no leaves. The green is creeping up the side of the mountains with the hot weather we have had this week. It is unusually humid. We had a big rain yesterday, but it did little to clear the air. The foothills are covered with low hanging clouds, but the sky is clear. 

Today is the Vespa Festa! Over 800 Vespas will be arriving in CVS. A few outriders showed up last night riding antique Vespas. I was much more excited to see that. I thought everyone might show up in Vespas that were motorcycle size. The bad news about old Vespas is that they are very stinky. The people here have been working so hard to pull off this amazing event. Lunch is being catered, but the gym had to be set up for the 800+ people. 1000 gift bags had to be stuffed with swag from sponsors and the entire town is spick and span with informational signs everywhere. 

Political Digression:

You may not know that I was a political science major in college. Even then I was looking for facts to fuel my ability to argue my political positions effectively. It was a useless pursuit, because facts are of no interest to many people. Now, I try to keep my options to myself. For instance, probably none of you know that I am supporting Bernie.

Hence, it is unbelievable to me that the U.K. has voted to leave the E.U. Ireland, Scotland and people under 50 voted to stay in the E.U. It was older, English people that voted to get out. Young people are saying that the old have sold their future. It seems that at least some oldsters are regretting their knee jerk anti-immigrant vote. Informational websites were swamped with people wanting to know just exactly what they had voted on. E.U. officials say that England will be out of the E.U. in a week. The pound has lost about 1/4 of its value already. Their are many English people with homes in Italy. I am wondering if they will be reduced to our status of only being able to stay three months at a time.

HIkers, possibly German just marched by. I guess they are headed up to the Sirentes to do some day trekking. They have full day packs and walking sticks. A few elderly women are talking in the middle of the road down the way, but otherwise it is just me and the birds!

We have been invited out to a friend’s house for breakfast at 8am. It is the earliest I have ever been invited over for a meal in any country. I am pretty excited, but also hoping there are not anchovies to eat. 

Doggy bag

There were no anchovies. There was coffee, cake, and the delicious waffle things. We had cherry jam, prune jam and delicious preserved figs. We got to bring a little of everything home with us. 

Same Church, Other Side

After that early start I went off to my painting spot. Drawing already completed, the pastel painted itself. No not really. I wouldn’t even like it if it did. I had this great idea that I would take a photo of a scene, draw it inside and add the color on location. Because it is so hot, this would allow me to paint longer and maybe finish things in one time. The bad news is that the more complex the scene, the less accurate the drawing from a photo is. Especially if I am looking up at something. Photos distort perspective even more than I realized. I had to give up on one painting, because the drawing was so hard to follow when I was really looking at the scene. It worked fine for today, but this drawing only took about 10 minutes anyway. I do like using the cropping tool on the computer to decide on my composition. That is one thing that works well.


Today I was searching and searching for just the right color for the stones on the church. At last success! But then I dropped the pastel. The good news was that the color was so perfect I could not find it on the ground. The bad news was that it was gone forever. Oh well. I keep having to remind myself that I am going to be layering colors not just finding the perfect match. 

On to the wedding!!

Around 11 I got too excited to work any longer. As I walked back into town I saw crowds gathering in every shady spot. I raced home to find Jim gone already. Swiftly I changed my shirt and ran back toward town. Did I mention how hot it is? I heard a band start playing and then amazingly I walked up just as the band and bridal party were coming up from the street below. People were throwing rice from the balconies. Little girls carried the train. This is the tradition in CVS. The bride comes to the church through the streets. I have seen many old photos of it, but never the real thing. 

I have so many portraits that I need to paint. People keep reminding me that, “two years ago you took my photo!!!” I also have a nun, singer and violinist all from Roma to do right away. In the winter I guess I get to do the ones I want, but in the summer I will be painting to order. It is a lot of pressure. Some people do not photograph well and I do not want anyone to be disappointed. It was interesting that the people from Rome smiled in their photos. Very few people from here do. 

Ok, still waiting for the Vespas and it is pretty dang hot out. I thought it must be over a hundred, but no, it was in the 80s. There were little booths set up with people selling regional food. I had two bottles of water and two pieces of pizza, but I wanted you to see a photo of the truffles. Unfortunately I do not think the Vespa people were actually shopping. They purchased their lunch through a catering service and it is hard to carry much on a Vespa. We hunkered down in a decreasing amount of shade when the bad news came that the Vespas would be late. But the walking pilgrims did arrive, although no one seemed to notice. They looked hot and sunburned and had been walking much longer than the Vespas would be writing, but they attracted no interest that I could see and they did not get a mass.

Danni

Truffles

Finally the Vespas arrived amidst noxious fumes and tiny horns. There was a Roman Gladiator proving that the Romans did invent the Vespa and used it to conquer the known world. There was a citron, I do not know why, and a Vespa car.  

Our friend, Pasquale, waits for some traffic to direct!

Roman troops arrive

A few speaches and beautiful music

Our friend, Armando, tries out driving a Vespa Car. 

Vespas in piazza

The bride and groom arrived to stroll through the parked Vespas. Then there was a mass for the Vespas in the piazza and the singer and violinist preformed. Her voice was achingly beautiful. I thought I was sweating but then realized it was tears from the beauty of her voice. I have no idea what the song was about. Meanwhile my face hurts more than ever from smiling so much. I loved this day!

After being outside for so long, we have been hiding in the house reading. Soon it will be time to go back to the piazza and post this to my blog. First I think I will have to have a snack. These are the possibilities: cake, waffle things, amaretti, two kinds of tort-like things, breakfast cookies or biscotti. We need to have a desert pic-nic. Honestly this is how picnic is spelled in Italy. And remember “i” is pronounced long “e”. pee-neek.

Afternoon rest

A Brilliant Day

The last event of the festa San Giovanni was the concert in the piazza. It was really great!!

After a couple of breakfasts, I headed out to a new spot. This church has been restored by the people of CVS. They have made it a beautiful little spot and a new place for me to paint.

The Happy and Hot Painter

The New Park

The finished Pastel

Now I am sitting in the piazza drinking a cold coffee that is a little like a coffee milkshake only much smaller. Iced coffee does not exactly exist here, but this is very good with lots of sugar.

Thank goodness it is now downhill all the way home! Time for piazza and a shower.

After Lunch

The weather finally stabilized enough to risk taking the art supplies outside.

I finished the painting I started in the Convento.

Jim at Work

This was the best traffic jam I have ever seen in the piazza and that is saying a lot. A guy parked his semi blocking the entire intersection and ran in to the bar for a coffee. People were MAD!! They actually were honking in anger. I have never seen that happen!