Category Archives: Italy
Tuscany, Wonderful memories – We will be back!
Hi Everybody
With travel now not possible for the time being anyway, Tuscany will be very quiet, and we all feel for the awful situation in Italy and well as here in the UK and around the World.
But we will all return to Tuscany with its wonderful Cities and Towns, the Countryside, very friendly people, and the great food and delicious wine.
Just as soon as we all can, because it is such a magical place to visit and enjoy.
With that in mind I decided yesterday to paint a large watercolour (well for me ) of the sun rising across the Tuscan countryside. Derived partly from photos taken from San Gimignano looking East and other photos taken on our last visit to the area.
Tuscany. Early morning from San Gimignano. Watercolour on Arches Cold pressed paper 19 inches by 8.
Larger watercolours are exciting and challenging and this one has come out fairly well. It is 19 inches by 8 and will look nice mounted and framed I think. Something else to do!
Also here are a couple of very quick sketches, also from photos taken on that last visit to Sienna in Tuscany. These are both of the area away from the Campo in Sienna. There are so many wonderful sights there to paint but these two smaller sketches were also painted very recently whilst at home, sitting in the garden in the sun thinking of Sienna!
Early Lunch in Sienna. Watercolour 11 inches by 8 on Fabriano paper.
The Torre del Mangia Tower in Sienna sennets for the side streets. Watercolour sketch 9 by 6 inches.
In these days of isolation I am very lucky to have such an absorbing pastime of watercolour painting to while away the hours.
Maybe soon we will be able to get back to some golf!
Stay safe wherever you may be and lets all look forward to travel in the future.
All the best
Brian
Evenings, stormy and calm
Hi Everyone
Just a quick post with some new and old watercolours of evening skies
Lets start with a very recent watercolour of Rye and one of a scene on the Rhine also painted recently.
Evening at Rye in East Sussex. Watercolour 14 inches by 10 on Arches Rough paper.
Evening on the Rhine in Germany.watercolour 14 by 10 inches on Arches Rough Paper.
And some stormier skies :-
A Evening storm brewing At Antibes
Fishing boat at Littlestone beach as the storm approaches.
Blustery evening at Kinderdijk.
And some calmer Evening to end this post
Evening in Provence
The sun setting on the Ile de la Cite in Paris
Sunset in Tuscany
Happy travelling Everybody!
Brian
Portofino – An Italian gem!
This month just one painting, although a bit larger than normal in size.
This watercolour was painted from photos taken when I was last in Portofino a couple of years ago but the light on the water then lingers often in my mind which inspired this recent watercolour.
The painting is 19 inches by 7.5 to give plenty of room for the reflections of the buildings and boats in the bay.
I hope you like it and if you haven’t been to this area of Italy then get planning!
Happy travelling
Brian
PS. Although this painting has been sold there are many more in my shop at
http://www.artfinder.com/brianswatercolours
and at
https://www.artgallery.co.uk/artist/brian_tucker_2
maybe there you will see just the item for your home or as a gift.
Back to Venice – I wish!
Sitting here in the UK in what is now rather dreary weather, too wet for golf and my mind turns to Venice!
We have been lucky enough to have visited Venice on a few occasions and each time there is some magical new sight to see.
So going back through the many photos I have taken there I realised I have never attempted to paint a watercolour of Saint Mark’s Square, “Piazza San Marco”. So yesterday I decided to have go at it.
Once when we were there there was a bit of flooding in the Square which does happen quite often so I have tried to convey that in this watercolour. I thought I had better say that in case you didn’t notice!
I hope you enjoy looking at it and just to set the scene here are two fairly recent paintings of The Rialto Bridge and The Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute as well.
Ah, Venice, oh to be there now sipping a cocktail in Harry’s bar!
Happy travelling
Brian
Piazza San Marco -A watercolour 14 inches by 10 on Arches Rough 300gsm paper
Basilica di Santa Maria della Salute on the Grand Canal Venice from the Academia bridge. A watercolour 14 inches by 10 on Arches 300gsm paper.
The Rialto bridge on the Grand Canal in Venice. A Watercolour on Arches 300gsm paper.
Painting a little bigger!
All those years ago when I started painting watercolours from our travels around the world I found that small paintings were the thing to try.
Today I still enjoy quick and quite small paintings, even the odd postcard to friends.
Generally my paintings are 12 by 10 or 14 by 10 inches, as that does work for travel very well , and recently I have bought an A4 KHADI watercolour sketchbook for our next few trips.
But recently I wanted to try something just a bit larger, and a little more impressionistic. So I decided to go back to a photo taken a while ago of Florence and this watercolour, 20 inches by 14 is the result.
I am not entirely happy with it , I had a vision in my mind of the finished article which hasn’t quite occurred but I thought I would share it with you.
This view of Florence has thousands of roofs, so the idea was to leave those purely impressionistic whilst highlighting the Duomo and nearby major landmarks.
I hope you find it interesting, and back to more travel paintings in a little while.
Happy Travelling
Brian
I have recently updated my two Travel Guide Books which you can download as FREE pdf files from a page on this Blog.
They are for The Cote d’Azur and The North of Ireland.
I hope you will enjoy them!
Cruising in the Adriatic.
Hi Everbody
A few weeks ago we were lucky enough to be able to go on an Adriatic Cruise with four very good friends.
Before that we had spent a lovely week in Paris in beautiful weather and it was all very enjoyable. Good food, good wine and above all great company just makes a holiday so terrific.
Ile de la Cite from a river cruise in Paris
Our cruise departed from Venice and visited Ravenna, famous for it’s wonderful 6th Century Byzantine mosaics, Split where had delightful day visiting Trogir, a World Heritage Town, and Split too.
From there we sailed to Dubrovnik, where we visited the old town but as we had been there before also took a trip to Cavtat, a beautiful small village by the sea. After Dubrovnik we sailed on to Zadar, which has a very historic and lovely old town right by the sea. Our last port of call was Koper in Slovenia, and there we took a tour along the coast to Piran, a really delightful town on a little peninsula into the Adriatic. And then on into the hills to Istrian , where we met the local stall holders and sampled there excellent food, oil and wine. Slovenia seems areally lovely place as was Croatia for our earlier ports of call. Everyone was very friendly and we really enjoyed our very short time in these Countries. Good reason to go back for much longer!
Finally we arrived back in Venice and you can never tire of wandering the little back streets and crossing the many waterways cthat make Venice what it is. Away from the main areas it is often very quiet and peaceful and every corner brings a new and interesting scene. The opportunies to paint are everywhere and it will take me long time to try my hand at some of the photos that I have returned with.
That said there was some time on the cruise for a little sketching and watercolour painting and below are some of my attempts. Often done very quickly, so I hope over the winter to revisit these photos and paint some more reminders of our cruise. For those interested the cruise line was Silverseas and the ship the Spirit. All really lovely!
I hope you enjoy these paintings, and if you have been to these beautiful places that they will serve as a reminder, if you have yet to go there I know you will enjoy the whole area of the Adriatic.
Happy travelling and painting.
Brian
Dubrovnik from our cruise ship
A little beach near Dubrovnik
Cavtat in Croatia
Piran in Slovenia
The Rialto Bridge in Venice
Gondolas in Venice. Painted on a previous visit
Just off the Grand Canal in Venice. Painted on a previous visit.
Sketches in The Dordogne and Tuscany
Beynac on The Dordogne river
Castelnaud on the banks of the Dordogne River
Evening at Dome from Vitrac
Recently a friend and very talented artist, Peter Robson, gave a workshop which included ideas for silhouette paintings. I have tried it here with the view of Dome in the Dordogne from our hotel. Thanks Peter!
Monpazier is a Bastide town in the Lot and Garonne region of France, well worth a visit.
A street in San Gimignano in Tuscany. San Gimignano is famous for its 14th century towers.
The view of San Gimignano from La Lucciolaia Agriturismo, just 3 Kms away.
Tuscan farm with sunflowers near Volterra
A field of poppies in Tuscany
Escape from the snow
This January we managed to have a few days on the Cote d’Azur , escaping quite lot of snow and disruption tin the UK.
Although even there we had some rain, we also had beautiful sunshine and some welcome warmth.
We spent one day visiting friends in San Remo and Dolce Acqua, just across the border in Italy. The old towns of both are quite amazing. I have included here one painting from our last visit to San Remo in 2011, but the others I managed to do last weekend. Also there is a watercolour of the view from Villefranche across to Port Passable on Cap Ferrat. We love Villefranche where you can sit at the waters edge and enjoy both the view, and a great lunch. If you are ever there do visit the Chapelle St Pierre at the waterfront. Inside there are wonderful murals by Jean Cocteau.
Back now in the UK, the snow is still here and it is a lot colder, maybe spring will arrive soon!
I hope you enjoy these four paintings.
Dolce Acqua, Liguria
Port Passable ,Cap Ferrat from Villefranche
In the old town of San Remo
San Siro, from Via Palma, San Remo
