The Potted Garden, Pienza (painting complete)

With school out for the Thanksgiving holiday, my studio time has been a little dicey. But now that we are back in session I have managed to wrap up my posting about the Pienza painting from earlier last week. Before I dive into painting the potted plants, I finish up the main architectural features of the painting-- the final touches on the windows and doors, and completing the distant bench.

 Now let's move onto the flowers!

Here is the final:

"The Potted Garden, Pienza" Oil on panel, 12x12" Click here for more info!

The hill town of Pienza is lovely for a number of reasons. First, it overlooks the gorgeous Tuscan valley called the Val d'Orcia. Second, like so many of these small towns,  the whole village is oozing with charm and dripping with flowers, just like the scene I have painted. Third, it is the home of Pecorino cheese! Need I say more?

Sant' Antimo (Tuscany) painting complete

It took longer than I would have wanted to finalize my latest landscape painting of Tuscany, but I am really pleased with the final. Picking up from my prior post about this painting, here are a couple of additional progress shots: Continuing work to further articulate the background landscape:

...and here I begin to work on the Abbey:

Here, at last, is the final!

"Path to Sant' Antimo" Oil on Linen, 24x30" Click here for more info!

Sant' Antimo Abbey is a beautiful Romanesque (formerly Benedictine) monastery dating back to the 1100's. It is situated in the stunning landscape of the Montalcino commune, and rests about 10 km from the town of Montalcino, (home of the gorgeous Rosso di Montalcino and Brunello wines).

In springtime the landscape of Montalcino and surrounds are strewn with poppies and other wildflowers, and the hillsides are often touched with the soft yellows and greens of golden broom.

I have a lot of reference photos of this abbey from my visit there several years ago. But I particularly like this view, which shows the focal point as a hint of the abbey in its lovely setting, but doesn't scream "portrait of a building". I also enjoy the point of view, which puts the viewer firmly on the pathway beneath the tall cypress trees, and nearly eye level with the abbey, adding to the sense of "being there".

Sant' Antimo painting W.I.P. (cont'd)

I thought I would share a progress shot of the painting of the Montalcino valley (Tuscany) I've been working on. I have been under the weather, which delayed my progress for a few days. But now I think I'm getting back on track.

I now have the whole canvas more or less blocked in. I decided to remove the tree foliage that I'd indicated  in front of the abbey because I felt it hindered rather than added interest. I had to refer to a few other photos I had taken from different angles to figure out what is behind there, but I think the change opens it up a bit and things make more sense overall. I hope soon to be able to share the final piece....I'm getting closer!

Sant' Antimo painting progress

I thought I'd share a few quick shots of the Sant' Antimo Tuscan landscape I've been working on. The first color I lay in is the sky and clouds and distant mountains. The clouds will be the lightest value in the painting, so I want to "key" that in at the start.

Next come the darkest values- the majestic cypress trees so prevalent in Tuscany. At this point I also establish a rough lay in of the shadows of the abbey and cypresses:

Once that's done I set about fleshing out the rest of the painting. No highlights on these areas yet. But I am establishing some of the wonderful patterns in the terraced hillside and distant landscape.

Sant' Antimo on the Easel

We are back from the beach now. It was great but high winds thwarted any further attempts at plein air painting there for the remainder of the week. Anear-constant rain has kept me indoors so far this week as well, so I have started a new Tuscan studio painting to console myself ;) .

This is to be a new 24x30" canvas of the Montalcino commune in southern Tuscany, at the site of the Sant' Antimo Abbey.

Happy July 4th, everyone!