I arrived home last night safe and sound. Several international flights arrived in Atlanta simultaneously and thus an empty customs area filled quickly with people awaiting their reentry to the United States. Although our flight was fifteen minutes early, and I did not have any checked baggage, it still took over an hour from landing to meeting my darling hubby at the top of the escalator at Hartsfield Jackson Airport.
I refuse to be burdened by such a slight inconvenience though as fate smiled on me when boarding the last nine hour leg of my journey home in Paris and the boarding agent informed me “you’ve been upgraded to business class.” What a difference in feeling the jet lag the ability to stretch out and sleep, wrapped in a down comforter with sound proof headset playing beautiful classical music makes in ones ability to bounce back in a new time zone.
But for the fact I know he has business that needs his attention here, I was very tempted to create a sudden phobia of flying and beg my beloved to bring the children and move to be with me in Florence, Italy. A gentleman, in a chance conversation on the vaporetto – the public boat transportation in Venice, warned me that he had gone to visit Florence 32 years earlier and never left and I can certainly see why.
The most populated city in the Tuscan region of Italy, Florence has a rich history in the Middle Ages and Renaissance period’s architectural and art movements. It was also a central area of Medieval trade and banking industry.
Knowing my time was limited for seeing as much as possible of the region I opted to take an all day bus tour through Tuscany. I cannot recommend this $100 adventure enough as it was worth three times that amount easily for the value it brought in experiencing a day under the Tuscan sun.
Even the tour buses were artfully decorated in Tuscany.
The bus left at 8:30 in the morning and as we left the city and drove to our first destination, our wonderful tour guide, Freya, delighted us with tales of the history of Florentines and then an explanation of what to expect with our guide in Sienna. I had the pleasure of meeting several people on the tour, including a delightful family from my home state of Georgia with a son near the age of my children. Enjoying their company on the tour only enriched the experience as I listened to their stories of other travels and got a little bit of the vision through teen eyes. Thank you Jeff, Mary and Matthew.
The Sienese proudly speak of housing the first banking system in Europe, their 700 year old university, and the community spirit of their annual Palio, a traditional medieval horse race run around the Piazza del Campo each year since 1656. This hugely attended event is prepared for all year by the 17 neighborhoods that make up the area, each having their own flag with an animal symbol representing them. Each neighborhood is assigned a horse in a lottery and has hired a professional jockey to ride their horse, bareback, in the roughly 90 second race which will give the winning neighborhood bragging rights for the year until the next race. It was regaled that in no other place can you see so many grown men crying as they win or lose their wagers than immediately after that race. The prize for the winning neighborhood, a flag depicting the Virgin Mary.
A small section of the Piazza del Campo in Sienna.
Thirsty? Drinking in Piazza del Campo.
Following our guided tour and hour of free time to explore Sienna, we were on were way through the country side which grew more beautiful with each kilometer of vineyard and sunflower fields in our midst. We arrived near lunch time at a farm where we were given a tour and explanation of their organic farming process, wine and olive oil making, and then served a fantastic lunch with several wines to drink (not just taste) to our contentment. More than a few of us left giddy and laughing with a dizzy head.
One-day-old calf.
Lunch with much wine to taste.
From our al fresco table was a view of our next stop, known as the medieval Manhattan for its towering buildings, San Gimignano. Legend has it that to show their wealth, families in the city would build towers, each hoping to exceed the height of the one built before. Once a height restriction was imposed, around the 1230’s, families began to purchase double plots of land and build two towers to the maximum height allowed, thus the first Twin Towers were born. Today the area remains a resort for tourist and artists, and home of the best ranked gelato in the world for the last two years.
The final stop was in Pisa, a city ancient Romans referred to as an old city (now that’s old.) I was exhausted and overwhelmed by all that we saw in the former stops, and after making a quick walk around, taking a few pictures that included tourist photographing each other appearing to hold the leaning bell tower up, I grabbed an icy drink called a granita, and watched the tourist play in the grounds surrounding these buildings that were built before the U.S. was even discovered by Europeans.
It was a blistering hot day, and backpackers and children alike enjoyed frolicking in the irrigation sprinkler when it kicked on late in the day. I knew I was going to have to sit on a bus for 90 minutes to return to my Florence home base, or I might have joined them.
And now my journey really begins as I start to sort through the three thousand photographs I took and paint from their inspiration. Be sure to check back often and I will share more stories and interesting facts as they relate to whatever my fancy drives me to paint each day.
Dear Friends & Family ~
I will need to write about remainder of trip when I return to Atlanta. I have much to share and many photos to post but alas The Boboli Gardens & the Uffizi need to be toured before I depart Florence this afternoon to begin the end of my journey home via Paris.
I leave you with this thought… don’t wait for the “right” time… follow your passion, you won’t regret it. I have found traveling alone, at first, a bit frightening and now empowering. We have long spent our lives thinking “if” this, “then” that… Live your “then” now…
I woke early this morning in hopes of capturing morning light and Venice before the tourist crowds descended. Exhausted after at least eight hours of non-stop walking and shooting, I’ll be short on words and let the photos speak for themselves.
Navigation through Venice feels a lot like being in a huge maze. The streets are more like what we call alleys, but very narrow and winding without obvious logic. Most of the time they’re paved with cobblestones and occasionally there will be wood panels around an area of construction. I was quite startled while walking down this street and a separation in the plywood revealed I was walking over water!
A couple of years ago while shopping or a new home, David and I bantered about purchasing one on the lake. The only problem was it was on the other side of the lake from where his office is and the daily commute would be less than fun. We hypothesized about him taking a boat daily to cross the lake and docking and driving the few minutes to his office. While our experience would not have included 100% boat transportation, it was as close as we would likely come in Georgia to living in Venice, the city without cars, only water transportation.
I bought a three day pass to use their public ferries to move from place to place around the city. While on the ferry it’s not feasible in shoulder to shoulder crowds to focus my SLR camera, so I end up using my “spy” point and shoot to capture daily existence in Venice.
Family “van”
Waste management…
Some things stay the same no matter where you are. This little girl was having a ball playing with these feisty cats with a string and bobbin.
This is the view from the Grand Canal of the Peggy Guggenheim Modern Art Collection museum in her former Venetian home.
I really enjoyed seeing some of the paintings that had been discussed with Tjasa during my week with her. I took copious notes so that I could further research some of the artist. While walking around it as announced that there would be a lecture on Calder at a certain time. The name rang a bell but I couldn’t place where, and then it dawned on me that was the artist responsible for the large red metal sculpture in front of the Musical Arts Center where David and I met while working at Indiana University. This is the sculpture in front of the Venice museum.
As the day came to an end, my exhaustion caused a bit of sadness to hit as I watched the families with their teen children dressed for dinner and I admired how beautiful they looked and remembered that I too have a beautiful family I can’t wait to show this special city.
It has been raining off and on here in Slovenia the last couple of days, so I decided to take a small break from the touring and spend some time regrouping, reading and painting here in the studio.
Every evening Tjasa shares a slide show with me and discusses a topic as she would do when teaching a workshop. I had an art history class in college but it was at 2:30 in the afternoon in a dark auditorium where I was assigned a back row seat. I always tape recorded the class because staying focused was nearly impossible for me under those conditions. Transcribing those tapes for rote memorization did little to show me what makes good art. Tjasa has attended several top art schools in Europe and is well versed on the topic according to academia.
You know those paintings you have seen in museums and asked yourself “how on earth did this get in a museum? it looks like a child/deranged person/idiot painted it!” I’m not sure I agree with them, but I do feel better versed in understanding the “genius” art educators and critics have assessed these works to possess now.
While packing for this trip I glanced at my art bookshelf and picked a book that was the right size to fill the spot in my luggage that I could read for education on the plane. The book I grabbed is called Mastering Composition: techniques and principles to dramatically improve your painting, by Ian Roberts. I was blown away when I realized how it could have been a text book to supplement the information I am being given each day during our slide shows. All because it was the right size!
I have a friend, Sissy, whose paintings are shown in some of the finest galleries in the country. She has mentioned that she is influenced by the works of Matisse. I knew the name “Matisse,” and there were a few significant pieces of his work that I could pick out of a stack and identify as his, but that was the extent of my expertise on the subject. A post impressionist painter, Matisse is considered a master in the use of color. There is a very logical consequence to the choices he made when painting, even the green faces.
We viewed several slides of his work and Tjasa pointed out the specifics of this logic and engaged me in conversation. Today she asked me to use some of my time to apply the logic to a painting in the style of Matisse. The subject matter was my choice, a small still life arranged in the window, but the color sense is purely based on Matisse color logic.
Not sure this one will go on my wall, but Tjasa was impressed with the execution of the assignment and found the colors to be following the correct sequence and original all at the same time. I took that as a compliment.
I had another assignment from yesterday that was unfinished, to paint using a lot of texture. I chose to reference a photo I took in Amsterdam on my first day overseas and approach it in two different fashions. One based on German Expressionists and the other French Impressionists. After working on them for a while, I couldn’t resist painting the scene in my own media, pixels, as well. Guess which is which.
Tomorrow I leave this humble artist’s abode and continue my journey to the beautiful city of Venice. It has been several days since I have been able to talk to my sweetheart while he tours the Pacific with his brothers. I’m sure the romance of the city will bring a little lump to my throat as I miss him greatly. I’ll leave my artist’s eyes switched on and try to stay distracted but without a doubt will note wonderful places I will want to visit with him, as a lover, when I next return.
Yesterday’s painting tour took me to a beautiful area of the Adriatic Seacoast in Italy, the town of Trieste. It’s a wonder that I don’t have road rash on my chin from my jaw being in a constant state of drop as my eyes absorbed the scenes around me.
My driver navigated the Italian roads with confidence and whipped into a seemingly benign parking spot off the main thorough-way.
We walked through a roadway tunnel that thankfully had a sidewalk, and came out at the entrance of Miramare Castle Park.
The beautiful iron gates at the entrance were a slight introduction to the rush of splendor to come. My arms full of painting equipment I could only grab a few snapshots with my small point & shoot camera as we made our way through the winding paths that lead to the gardens and castle of Maxmilian of Habsburg (later to become emperor of Mexico.)
Knowing the sequence of my concentration by now, Tjasa, my instructor (see previous posts), showed me a map of the grounds and encouraged me to walk through and fill my camera SD card before I sat down to paint the day’s assignment. I literally had to stop and use some relaxation techniques to center myself before I felt I could do any justice to my photo journaling.
A significant part of staying at the artist’s villa in Slovenia is a daily slide show and lecture on some aspect of art and what historically has been seen as genius. The painting exercise for yesterday was about shapes and how they work together to make or break a composition.
After hiking through the park and feeling content that I had captured what I wanted from the area digitally, I decided to stay under the cover of the park’s cafe and plein air paint the gardens that were positioned directly in front of it, as there were storms signaling their future arrival in the distance.
It was clear that the park was a popular destination for children’s summer camp field trips. I was able to tune out the chaos of the afternoon diners, including the elevated noise of the children. Little by little they became intrigued with what the artist in the dining area was doing and started to gather. A few brave ones ventured to ask me questions, but I had to look at them pathetically and say “no Italiano, English only.”
My new audience was a small group of ten-year-olds who watched with great intrigue as I painted my assignment. As a mother, tuning out children’s chatter has become part of my life. I explained to childless Tjasa that a mother is more worried when there is no noise than when a consistent hum of sound is in her background.
I could tell by the tone of their voices that they were discussing what they wanted to ask me before a brave soul would approach and in perfect English pose their questions. Mostly they were the basic questions “where are you from?” and then a whisper of “America,” “America,” as they shared the information with each other.
One future art collector approached and asked “how much?” I nearly fell out of my chair suppressing my laughter as I contemplated selling him the piece on the spot, or figuring out a way to tell him “no sale” with smiles and pointing. I ended up shaking my head and pointing to myself indicating the painting was just for me.
After a while it became clear to my small audience that what I was painting was not going to be a realistic representation of the vista in front of us and I had to resist cracking up and embarrassing them as I could discern their assessment of my work as “original” and “modern art.” Fortunately for my ego they also peppered their phrases with words I think meant beautiful and pretty. Most touching was when they would shush each other and say the artist needed to concentrate.
As frequently happens when painting, an artists enters a zone where time seems to stop. I am going to guess my audience was with me for a little over an hour because the larger lunch crowd had dispersed and all that remained was me and my little fan club and their guardians on the patio.
I decided I was done with the days assignment and sat back in my chair, feeling a tear in my eye as the children broke out in applause to recognize the conclusion of my performance.
I began my art career because I loved to paint children, and am now stretching to paint more than their portraits of innocence, but will remain thankful for the special integrity in living that children will always have.
Checking the weather, Tjasa suggested that yesterday would be the best day to go to the Alps, leaving beach paintings for the remainder of our tours. We saw the clouds coming in as we were driving higher and higher to our destination, but decided to try to get a little plein air painting in anyway.
I was blown away by the beauty of emerald colored river flowing parallel to the road we were driving up the slopes. I knew we were getting higher in altitude because my ears were popping and I was feeling a little light headed. Having brought others here before me, Tjasa knew the precise spot to travel down a long gravel road that would land us in a wide open rocky beach on the shore of the river.
We could see the clouds darkening in the distance but decided to go ahead and set up the easel and see what I might accomplish, following her instructions to paint many lines within my work as the lecture with slides the previous night were about the genius of linear work by artists in previous centuries and currently. Knowing my propensity to take pictures as much as possible, she encouraged me to just paint and not stop for photos so that I might get as much done before the impending storm arrived. I agreed in theory, but couldn’t fight my urge to click away and capture as much of the surrounding beauty as I could before we were forced out by the gales.
As I unpacked the painting supplies I realized I forgot to refill my water bottle (for painting) and turned to tell Tjasa of my error, when I realized I was standing just inches from some of the freshest water available, so filled my small jar straight from the river.
Not long after I had started my composition, I heard voices and laughter as several rafts and kayaks came swishing around the bend we were positioned near. I grabbed the camera again because the vibrant yellows and reds of their equipment set a really fun contrast against God’s gem colored river and sky colors, divided by the masses of all hues of green.
The rafters beached very near where I was set up after waving and doing small poses in hopes of being added to my painting. They definitely broke my concentration, but I found it amusing as well. One guy yelled something to me and Tjasa was in the distance behind me working on another project, so I shook my head in the negative and yelled “English only!” As he descended from the water, in perfect English he said “Oh English, no problem” and proceeded to tell me that the storm was a mere 10-15 minutes away and I should prepare to take cover.
I’m glad the painting I was doing was an exercise and not intended for completion because the gentleman decided I looked lonely and needed conversation. He was greatly intrigued how a woman from Atlanta could be found in the middle of nowhere on the edge of a river in the Slovenian Alps. How would I know to find this place? I assured him that I was with a guide and not just lucky to find this little corner of paradise.
It was far to distracting to continue painting with the storm ascending from the left and the guy chattering away in my right ear, so I grabbed the camera and captured a few more shots as I packed up the easel and paints to head for cover. My new friend asked if I wanted him to take my camera in the river to more fully capture the clouds coming around the mountain, but I declined in lieu of losing my important tool before the rest of my journey should he slip and fall giving said camera a bath it really didn’t need.
This morning I woke early and felt immediately inclined to revisit the photos and do some digital painting.
We proceeded to a nearby village just as huge raindrops started to fall. Tjasa went for a coffee and suggested I might wind my way through the quaint tiny streets of the area. It started to really pour before I could walk far, so I stopped under a shop awning and was thrilled to capture several shots of people running too and fro with their bright umbrellas. In between surges of rain, I stuck my camera under my shirt and would jog to a new covered location. Thankfully the owners of the car park area behind a home didn’t seem to mind my trespass.
When I made my way back to the cafe, Tjasa inquired about my success in photographing some interesting things. She is amused by my mania with shooting all the new-to-me views and wondered how many photos I had accumulated so far. I guessed around 800 and was pleased to calculate 1,013 when we returned home that afternoon. This would have never been possible with film, but thanks to digital….. I’m rockin’ and rolling!
When I woke this morning and walked around the bed and breakfast, reacquainting myself with the rooms I had explored the night before, I was stopped in my tracks and caught my breath as the sun came through the window and created this vignette. I ran back to my room and grabbed my camera to capture the moment and found some quiet time later in the day to paint the scene.
This is the chair that I sit in and type on my computer, or chat on Skype with my family. I’m looking forward to painting the other roomscapes I captured as the sun bounced off the white-washed walls and onto the colorful paintings of my instructor, hostess and new friend artist Tjasa Iris.
We spent the day at this 15th century fortress exploring and then painting. Tjasa discussed painting with broad strokes to loosen up, get used to the environment and some other instructions.
While I was always given the opportunity to choose what I wanted to paint, she had a limitation of time or palette that she used to draw something from me. The paintings are not intended to be final pieces but explorations and permission for me to step outside of my comfort zone.
Just before sunset we walked down a country path through a vineyard to eat dinner at a farmhouse.
The grapes looked promising of a good harvest and my photo journaling promising of extraordinary original art.
Roughly seven hours after departing my hotel in Bologna I arrived at my destination, Villa Rosa, in Slovenia. The bus stop was right outside the front door of the hotel, and for one euro I was dropped at the Bologna Central train station. A very large train station at that.
Fortunately I had the intuition that my pronunciation of Italian cities might be a bit off and wrote down the name of my destination city, Gorizia, for the ticket agent. Although I’m giving Italiano my best effort, lack of vocabulary iced with my gentile southern (Indiana) English dialect has fortunately net me a response in at least broken English everywhere I go.
Oddly enough I find myself peppering these attempts with a “Bueno” or “C’est bon?” here and there. What the heck? I don’t speak Spanish or French either, I quickly remember as I am answered in one or the other.
While on the five hour train ride I pulled out what we who own bigger SLR cameras call our spy cameras, meaning small point and shoot cameras, and did some drive-by-shooting from the train.
I was particularly taken by what I believe are cypress trees as they stand in rows dotting the countryside.
I’ve always been fascinated by the juxtaposition of the old and the new when they spontaneously appear together in a landscape. I saw several fields of freshly mown hay, in the classical round bales of our painting forefather impressionist’s vistas, but behind this particular one I noted a fairly new BMX bike course. (This one’s for you Keaton.)
The next photo did not come out very clear (drive-by-shooting after all), but this sea of yellow is the sole sunflower field I saw and gasped “oh… sunflowers” as I excitedly positioned the camera for the shot.
It was at that point that I found it necessary to try to convince my seat mate that I was not crazy, just an artist. She fully understood. She asked me to be sure and tour other parts of her fair country and not leave with the impression that the flat farmlands between Bologna and Venice were all that Italy had to offer. I assured her, as an artist, I see more than just what she felt was uninspiring.
My hostess warned me that it was cheaper to take a bus for one Euro to cross the border from Gorizia, Italy, to Nova Gorizia, Slovenia as a taxi driver will charge double for “crossing” just because they can and not for any real reason. As part of the European Union they are not really considered borders. I found it a bit of a challenge reading the bus schedules, which I’m sure would be complex if it was in your native tongue. Alas, I found the lone “International” schedule with a bus arriving momentarily to aid in my border crossing.
Imagine my surprise when the bus station in Nova Gorizia completely closed down. No windows for ticket sales, no restaurant or newsstand activity. Empty. Me, all by my self in this rather large closed down station at 2:00 on a Saturday afternoon. I finally found a tiny corner door with an information symbol on it and two guys standing outside speaking in yet another language that was all new to me. I pulled out the page I had printed from my destination’s website – thank goodness I thought to do that – and showed it to him and asked “Train? Taxi?” He said there was not a train to my destination village today and pointed across a small park to a taxi. We laughed that it was not like New York where you just wave and whistle until one stops (he did speak English, I didn’t suddenly acclimate to the Slovenian language).
Fortunately, the taxi driver was available and happy to take me to the village of Branik, where I am staying. He didn’t speak any English and will undoubtedly have quite a laugh with his family this evening as he tells of the American tourist who sat with her head hanging out the window. You see, I have a severe allergy to car deodorizers. It starts with a little ping in my forehead and evolves into a nightmare of a migraine. As I had already used half of the migraine kit I packed for just such an occasion, I did not want to lose another day because of said deodorizers. So I just did what dogs do and put my head out the window and enjoyed the fresh Alpine air.
After a great lunch with my mother and children yesterday afternoon, my daughter dropped me off at the train station and my journey began. I’m pleased to share that the special neck pillow I ordered worked like a charm and as soon as the lights were dimmed on the plane I slept very nicely. This is huge, as anyone who has flown with me before can attest, I generally cannot get comfy and am far from rested when arriving somewhere after more than an hour or two on a plane. I may have looked like an accident victim, but I tried to remember to take it off before walking around.
Amsterdam’s airport, Schiphol, is HUGE but I found a locker and stowed my carry on, grabbed my camera and hit the streets. It was interesting being amid a typical morning rush with a greater risk of being run over by a bicycle than a car! Bikes everywhere. Multi-level parking decks for bicycles. They do not wear helmets and it’s typical to see children just planted where they fit on the front or back of their parent’s bike. When an obstacle comes along, they just hop off and walk the bike around, jump back on and proceed.
I have not been to Amsterdam previously so I really just soaked it in, but look forward to revisiting a few shots for some original art creation.
I did not participate in Amsterdam’s notable past time, the only thing smoking on me were my feet when I realized I forgot to change into comfy shoes before stowing my gear. No worries though, I just jumped on a one hour canal tour and got to hear a little more about the history of Amsterdam and enjoy the sites of the morning water activities.
And unbelievably, as I stepped off the train upon returning to the airport, I turned a corner and who was there but Jeremy Sutton and Peggy Gyulai two of my favorite artist friends from San Francisco!
So now I’m waiting for my last leg of my inbound flight, suspecting it will be on a smaller plane as we will load on a bus to reach the plane. More to come!
