Final-ly Done!

I am finally finished with my semester.  Time to start packing for the US! This was a scene from Florence, right after the sun was setting.  The sky was a phenomenal electric blue, against the orange of the tower.  Just spectacular.

This project was a doozy.  I think I've learned a lot about myself in the past couple of months, especially when doing this project.  This is 24x36 inches, the largest I have worked so far.  I think I much prefer smaller paintings.  I really love being able to knock out one, if not more, paintings in one sitting.  Doing a larger one, maybe 18x24 every now and then is a nice change up, but I don't think I'm going to make any kind of habit out of it.  Plus, it is much more difficult to ship larger paintings from Asia.  :)

Tuscan Hillside and Dumpster Diving

"Tuscan Hillside"
9x12 Oil on Panel
Click Here to Purchase

This was a nice little side painting to do for class.  I've been getting a bit weary of the shophouses.  Sometimes you need a break when doing the same subject over and over again.  In any case, this was the view from the villa we visited in Tuscany on our wine and cooking class tour.  My husband learned how to "swirl" wine properly and make a mean ravioli from scratch.  Mmmmm. Yum.

This weekend I had another twilight zone experience.  As I was walking up the back road to the studio, I saw this dumpster:

Only in Singapore is everything so perfectly manicured that even the dumpsters are overflowing with flowers, right?  Ha! Well what happened is that when a new business opens, moves locations, etc, (especially if it is run by important people or is influential), lots of clients and vendors and other business owners will send a professionally arranged bouquet as congratulations.  These bouquets are usually HUGE.  They're usually on these big stands that make the bouquet as tall as a person, and two to three feet wide.  Well, this wedding coordinator had its grand opening, and what you see in the picture is just what they couldn't fit on the sidewalk in front of their front door.

Being my mother's daughter and loving flowers, I decided to go dumpster diving.  Yes, yes I did.  If I do say so myself, the results were pretty fantastic.  It hurt my soul to see such beautiful fresh flowers just thrown away so callously.

Best. Dumpster dive.  Ever. :)  I think my mother would be proud.