"The Villa Next Door" - SOLD

This was the villa directly next door to us. Not to drop names or anything, but this is where some very famous people vacation. This is a little plein air done in the morning before leaving for the day. I love the architecture and especially the working shutters. They are all solid wood which open and lock up for privacy/security. Every morning I loved being the first one up and throwing open the shutters to see the new beautiful day.

"Villa Malpensa" Abstract - SOLD

Thank you Jan & Richard for purchasing my painting and giving it a good home. May you enjoy it! This is a abstract I did of the place I stayed in Milan right before coming home. It's a big old grand hotel. I was playing around this weekend and did an abstract from a photo on their business card. I arrived there after 8:00 PM but had wanted to get there much earlier to enjoy the place. It was pretty expensive, so I felt like I pretty much missed my visit there. My painting shows the end of the day slipping away feeling I had.

Photo - Rear View of our Villa

This is the back corner of our villa showing just a piece of one of the gardens and distant views.

"Grapes from the Arbor"

I forgot to post this yesterday. This is another watercolor study of the fresh picked grapes from our patio arbor. They were placed on a strawberry patterned table cloth and I had to throw in some of those fresh cut flowers from the garden. After painting, I ate all the grapes!

"Garden Flowers"

More fresh cut flowers from our Villa gardens. I couldn't get over the endless supply of wonderful blooming plants that were so lovingly tended by our gardeners. Wish I could have brought them home with me! I was so motivated to paint everything in my path while there, that just quiet times on the patio were spent doing little watercolor studies. No, these are not my best works, but they are important moments I wanted to record in paint.

"Bougie on the Arbor"

This is a pen/ink watercolor postcard I did for my Italy journal. I was sitting on the patio and the color of the blooming bougainvillaea growing up the grape arbor support caught my eye. Scribble scribble, wash wash - postcard!

Photo of view from our villa

This is one of the views from our villa in Chianti country. You could see for hundreds of miles. Many crops had just been tilled under, but all the green is grapevines. I wanted to upload several photos at one time, but can't seem to figure out how to do it. Will post other photos later.

"Lilliano Door"

The little town of Lilliano was very close to our villa. There was a large winery there and one day we stopped by and painted on their property. They were harvesting grapes while 3 painters stood on their property painting various scenes - no one said a word or seemed to think it unusual. We just waived to the guy hauling the grapes and enjoyed our afternoon.

"Radda Church Tower"

Every town has a big church and usually a tower. Some are more magnificent than others. This painting was done in the field in the town of Radda in Chianti. We stopped when we had a vantage point and pulled out our paints and went after it. It's a small town close to where we stayed. We went there several times for market days, shopping and wine. This was not one of my favorite paintings, but I received positive feedback from my fellow painters, so I decided to share it with you. My first paintings were done in watercolor because they are so fast and travel friendly. Later during the trip I got out my oils and did a complete set up to paint. Will post them soon.

"Morning Roses"

Well I'm back from 2 glorious weeks in Italy. We had fabulous gardens at our villa and picked fresh flowers for our rooms every day. These little roses were picked the first day we arrived and while we drank our coffee outside I painted a quick watercolor postcard. This was a quickie painted while still in my jammies before our day really started. This trip was so wonderful, that I've decided to post a couple of my photos taken at the villa. Stay tuned!