Just a quick post to share what is in progress on the easel this week: My studio time (which includes painting, but also varnishing and framing, website updates, emails, blogging, photography, sales/marketing, office work, etc.) is now limited to a few hours every other weekday. Painting takes precidence, but every now and then I really must play catch-up with "everything else". So it was with Monday, and I only had time to do the layout in sepia:

Upon my return to the easel, I tackeled the block-in (first pass) which is still mainly shadows and midtones:

Time ran out before I was able to get to the hilltop buildings, but I was happy to have covered the rest of this 24x30" canvas in about 3 1/2 hours. Because I can't always get back to an "open" painting, I at least want to return to a canvas that is brought to the same level of completion in all areas.

This is a view I have painted before (a number of years ago) and I am returning to it now to see if I can use a looser approach. There is quite a bit of information in this scene, and my aim is to relay a feeling of the variety in the landscape of Tuscany, but in a more unified, simplified manner, without articulating everything in minute detail.