Touring Venice

There are some times when my habit of waking at 5:30 a.m. (on the dot, and usually no matter what!) comes in pretty handy. With family visiting these last 10 days, early mornings have allowed me a few hours each day to complete this new Venice piece:

"Touring Venice" Oil on linen, 24x20" (SOLD) ©Jennifer Young

This painting ( the bones of which you can see here) is the same size and format as the other recent Venice painting I posted a couple of weeks ago. They are meant to serve as companions to each other, though I think either would work just as well on its own.

In all the times I have been to Venice, I have still never taken a gondola ride. I wonder if it's possible to paint en plein air while aboard a gondola? A girl can dream...

More Venice, on the easel

I have a new Venice painting in the works this week. Here is the composition sketched in with thinned down burnt sienna. I have a lot of family visiting right now so any painting on this will need to happen in the wee hours of the morning this week before people start stirring. I doubt I will be able to do much blogging about its progress given my time constraints, but you never know. It's another 24"x20", to (hopefully) serve as a companion to the other Venice piece just completed.

Under the Bridge

Well, instead of blogging I have been tearing my hair out trying to figure out why my blog's RSS feed has not been updating. As a result, I did not get to do any progress blogging on this painting. But here it is, a new Venice painting that I managed to complete in between the hours of frustration:

"Under the Bridge, Venice" 24x20", Oil on Linen (SOLD) ©Jennifer Young

I was going through my archives of former paintings and found a little painting I had done a while back of a single boat beneath a lovely footbridge. I thought it might be nice to expand on that idea on a 24x20" canvas. I really enjoyed creating this new piece. While the boat is still featured, I was able to add a little more context and show more of the background. I really thought I would hate painting those rails, but once I figured out the design and started painting in the highlights, I rather had a good time.

As for my feed, we are still trying to figure out the best solution (though it will definitely not be feedburner!) If you are an email subscriber and received this post in your email box, then I've made progress, at least. If not, there's probably a bit more hair-pulling in my future.

Commissioned paintings for Frances Mayes' Tuscan Sun Wines

Speaking of commissions, I thought I would share a few details of what for me was a rather exciting (and consuming) commission this past winter:

Tuscan Sun Wines, LLC of Denver, Colorado, commissioned me to create seven paintings of the Italian countryside for their exclusive use on a new line of wine labels for writer Frances Mayes, author of Under the Tuscan Sun.

Each of the seven oil paintings portrays a theme that is central to life in Cortona, Tuscany and “Bramasole,” Mayes villa made famous by Under the Tuscan Sun. Listed here are pictures of my favorite pieces completed for this project. If you follow this link it will take you to the wine distributors website where you can see how the paintings look on finished labels!

Artist talk and reception this Tuesday

Just a quick post to announce an artist talk I will be giving this Tuesday, April 23rd, at 10 a.m., at Westminster Canterbury's Sarah Belle November Theatre in Richmond, VA. This will be an interview styled talk illustrated with a slide show, with questions opening up to the audience afterwards. The talk is in conjunction with the exhibition of my work hanging in the neighboring galleries. Reception immediately follows in the exhibit space located in the H. Scott November Gallery. Please call the cultural art center at 264-6268 for more information. Both the talk and the reception are open to the public, so if you are in Richmond, I hope you will consider coming out!