artist's retreat has had its first artist staying for a month.........

Since I bought my little house to use as an artist's retreat ( and a  place to rent out  as a "Pisticci Experience")
I have had a lot of guests from all over europe. But this is the first time I have had an artist come for a whole month.
( As the artist was married to a musician....I have been wondering where that could go too-as  there are a lot of musicians here and possible scope to play.......)
However back to art and Pisticci .
I am including part of an email Royane wrote about her experience here.  (  royanemosely.com  )

"I realized within a few weeks how important it is for a creative person to step out of the familiar and into  a different culture, surrounding oneself with the people, the food, the landscape and the light and the rhythm of daily life which is so different than our own. It's like unused circuits in the brain begin to fire.
The retreat has a spiritual quality - I don't mean in a religious way. It just feels good. It feels comfortable and somehow allows one's mind to open to new possibilities in one's chosen art form."

This is pretty much the affect I was hoping for.


Today I am sorting out a few small details and getting  the artist's retreat ready for the summer. I am almost completely booked until October - except for a few days in june and the first 2 weeks in september.
I am hoping for some longer term guests in the autumn and even the winter as there is now a pellet stove which should keep the house warm. ( I provide an electric blanket too.)
You can find me on AIRBNB as "small house in Pisticci"

I bought this little house because I wanted to share the experience/joy/fun/inspiration/love  that I have found here. Hope to see you soon..............

1st of may- summer is a coming...........

I gave up on writing 500 words a day for 31 days , because I was just too busy. My Artist's retreat is now as ready as I know how but it took a lot more work than I anticipated to get it ready.
And along with several commissions - I  thought I had more than enough to do.
It did however teach me that if I had to I could write 500 words on pretty much anything in a reasonably short period of time. I would like to think also that if I do it again later in the year that a month of writing would improve my writing skill. It did help with the perfectionism which was the reason I wanted to do the project in the first place.
So having said that I am just going to write about today.
I have been at home all day as I would like to have the weekend off- if you can count getting up at 5.30am on sunday morning to go to a market with paintings time off?
So I have been getting up at about 6.15am every morning in order to have a longer day. (some days it works- other days I just fall asleep at 5pm for half an hour and  miss the bus to yoga class.....)
But today I worked on a large painting all morning and finished it. In between advising my guests in the Artist's retreat where to find the instructions for the washing machine. ( I am hoping that they will give me a demo before they leave as working machinery is not one of my skills)
Then while making lunch I had to decide whether to sit outside - using heat of sun but not able to use computer or sit inside and put on gas heater and work on computer. It was very frustrating but it is that time of year when it is warm outside but still chilly inside.
I also had another little job to do which involved painting over a figure on a table top which I had previously painted. It wasn't difficult but was quite funny at one point when there was only head and hands left showing. It is nearly covered up now and only remains to be varnished again- and again -- and again. as it's to be used in a cafe. It's quite fun to do something like that- I have another one to do when that one is delivered..
After that I started work on something I am doing as a sort of translation. It was quite a lot of work but I really enjoyed being challenged.I have a large pile of books (dictionaries, thesaurus, both english and italian) which makes me feel very industrious. I hope to finish it tomorrow - if I get up at 6.15am -yawn!
After that I went outside to get some inspiration to write a blog post and found something rather peculiar. . I have had a yellow rose for the last 2 years which I have broken bits off ( there is probably a technical term for this , but I don't know what it is.) and stuck them in soil and so now I have about 6  little rose bushes. But now, one of them has pink roses. How is that? There is also another plant which seems to have 2 different kinds of flowers on it. Very odd!
However my flowers are looking wonderful and  my street is so pretty at the minute. I am intending to paint it as often as I feel like . I never used to be much of a gardener so I am fairly impressed by how good it looks.
Now it must be about time for a glass of wine so I will plonk some photos on this post and welcome the weekend.

something different for an exhibition

sold this painting of my flowers

love this 

finished this today (60x80cms)

my industrious desk