Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Tuscany, here we come!

Two weeks of touring and painting in Tuscany for me and my friend, Carol Pike-Webb starting Thursday, Sept. 1st!  This tour, organized by a neo-impressionist Margaret Egli-Thomson, will be 5 or 6 days of painting the beautiful landscapes around San Gimigniano (Siena) Italy, and another 6 days of touring the neighboring cities including Florence.  The Agriturismo (hotel) where we will stay is www.podereilpino.it.
I somehow managed to pack extremely light so I hope I have enough clothes and paint.  Well, the upside is that I have room for my laptop (Big Bertha).

Camden, Maine

I had a week of painting in Maine and rented a house with two friends, Lynn Murray and Karen Berger.  You can't go to Maine for a week without having some rain, so we had the first few days to travel around looking at museums and galleries.  I visited Portland Art Museum on my up and had the luck to get there just as a seminar was starting about artists who populated the area called Sequinland: Maine Moderns, Art in Sequinland, 1900-1940, which was given by Libby Bischof, a docent who made it a very interesting visit.  The John Marin show, Modernism at Midcentury, was very extensive and very well presented.  Karen and I took in the Farnsworth and the video presentation about Andrew Wyeth.  It was produced and directed by the family and was a joy to see.  There was good footage of their home movies and plenty of information given by Andrew who was narrating the video.  I am a big fan of NC Wyeth.  Of course, it's always a special event to visit the Dowling Walsh Gallery across the street from the Farnsworth and this time was no exception.  Large paintings by Alexandra Tyng were featured and her paintings are breathtaking.  Another gallery stop was the Haynes in Thomaston and the paintings of Peter Poskas and Burt Silverman.  Lynn and I toured the area and saw the belted Galloways (cows) and many beautiful vistas.  Karen and I drove all the way to Arcadia, it's what you do on rainy days when you can't paint outdoors.  There were a couple of galleries in Camden that provided some excitement and motivation as well--Bayview Gallery and Camden Falls Gallery of Camden, Maine
We did paint for a few days, nothing like Maine for painting rocks!  As usual, I took hundreds of photos.