Shadows on the snow....

Have got a spare ten minutes this morning ( according to my self imposed schedule)
I like to start work on the hour or half past.
The title of this post refers vaguely to feeling like there are a lot of shadows lurking around my life just now. The biggest one is missing james. At this time last year i believed he was getting better and i was getting ready to spend 3 months or so in parma helping him to get better. Unknown to me he was actually gravely ill with sepsis  which i didnt know until i arrived in his hospital room and he was unconscious with an oxygen mask on.
On the previous visit we had spoken and made plans for helping him to get better . His prognosis was good. He was going to start standing up and was trying to write 
That's one shadow.
Then there is brexit. Enough said.
Then there are all the other little or big things.... nothing a brain transplant wouldn't fix.
But ....and am working on cheering myself up as i have a cold and i dont like winter and am spending too much time on my own......
So thinking about shadows on snow and its the shadows which make the snow beautiful. Just white is nothing.  Also  my friend says that its neccessary to always put some red in a painting and it certainly stands out well against white and shadows.  So todays  slightly weird, but might work for me plan, is to appreciate the shadows and chose to make some bright red bits in my life.
And as i am working on a big snow painting may incorporate this thinking.
Am posting a small view i did earlier  this week of the snow from my doorstep. 

Fallas in valencia

Been in valencia for the festival to welcome spring before returning to pisticci.
It was quite spectacular. The costumes of the ladies in the large procession were overwhelmingly extravagantly gorgeous. So colourful and intricate and so many..... then also the ladies and girls all walked so upright ( might have been the clothes ) that it made them seem stately and strong. If you ever saw pictures of strong looking, beautiful  Spanish women in books from the past then this was like that but multiplied.
There were fireworks going off almost 24 hours a day and I would like  to come back and see the displays closer up. From where I was staying I could see the higher explosions all round the city .
Then I was lucky  enough to be able to see the burning of the effigy. ( enormous  figures in amazing contortions and - well you just had to see them.) At the end of my street.  I think I read that there were 750 of them all over the city  and they were all burned to end the festa. There were even more fireworks, loud music  and plumes of black smoke in every direction.
Today am hoping  to go visit the giant figure of the Madonna covered in flowers carried by the beautiful ladies in the procession.
I really think I may have to come back next year. This is a very brief description of something special that you really need to experience not read about.

a sunny morning in Pisticci- perfect scootering weather.....

It's nearly the end of July and such a lot has happened worldwide and personally since I last wrote. It's like the outside world has intruded on my little  fairytale life................
However  there are still many lovely things happening here and one of the nicest things to do in this gorgeous weather is to get on my scooter about 8.30am and dawdle off  to the nearest cafe. It's a different experience scootering in the summer when I can zoom around with tee shirt , shorts and sandals .
Work and leisure are very mixed here. I often get commissions from meeting people in cafes and yesterday I took a photo when I was dawdling about, reluctant to go home and its now drawn on a large canvas and ready to paint.
So am just going to look for some summery, relaxed photos which only give a glimpse of the experience that is living in Pisticci.

My life, mostly, as a story continues........

It's been ages since I wrote on this blog because I always think it has to be perfect and fascinating, brilliant and witty, entertaining and knowledgeable etc etc.......
It's a wonder I do anything with an attitude like that.....being a perfectionist is dumb ( though it does keep me trying ...)
On the other hand it could just be that I am lazy and boring and illiterate........
So now that I have got that out of the way,  how is my "fairytale" life going?
Well , more than once recently I have pondered on the fact that I appear on the surface to have become  someone I would have liked to have been and am mostly living a life that I could not have dreamed of because it's way beyond anything I thought I could ever do.
Before I go any further , to add a reality check, am still only eating softtish food as I can't afford to go back to the dentist, will probably still have a roof leaking in new places and an alarming bulge in the ceiling under upstairs plumbing this winter as I need to eat before fixing the roof, I won't be turning the hot water on now till I go back to once a week in October (It'll be lukewarm all summer- who needs hot water when its 30c outside.) and I will likely be back to wearing 3 jumpers and a hat inside from about november till march.
But mostly it's worth it.
I get to live as an artist. I paint portraits which people buy to give as gifts. ( that seems such a big thing to me- , to make something that is for a gift.) My studio despite its failings is so pretty - and in summer it's perfect. The weather is miles better than that in the uk. The local people are spectacularly kind and friendly. I get to practice speaking another language- and am mostly proud of my efforts. I get to drink great coffee and I can afford to buy good wine and eat (well, sort of......)delicious food. I can wear anything I like and never be overdressed. I walk up town and greet people and they greet me back . I go to concerts and plays and hear musicians in both small venues and out of doors and enjoy theatre completely different from anything I was ever used to. Recently I have worked alongside other artists which is a great treat.
But mostly I get to live in another culture where despite my lack of language I have felt at home.
Today , as I was passing the nearest restaurant I was given a copy of a new guidebook made by some of the people of Pisticci  showing some of the local attractions and traditions and I am in it too. That makes me mostly very, very happy indeed.
 I am including some photos which I will probably turn into paintings at some point ,including my new little arbour and winetable.
Today am off to meet a friend for coffee and prosecco because it's Thursday, finish a portrait, write another blog post, pay a bill in the commune and then sit on my doorstep with a glass of wine- at least that is the plan. I got up at 6.30am so that I could have time off for coffee, but as I am sitting at the table with the door open and the sun streaming in, it's not exactly been a hardship . I am looking over at my new summer fireplace which always makes me smile.
Hurray for summer and Pisticci.

discovering the calanche......

Although I have lived here for more than ten years and I knew the calanche were important I had never really seen them up close. Now I think I may have to explore them further and maybe  that is where i will start painting from life......................................so many things to learn................

think these shapes were made by the sea, the wind and the sun

weird landscape

this is spectacular when you are actually there.

mixed landscape

only 20 mins from my studio

one of many beautiful wild flowers

close up of the earth with orange and blue shadows

My "palace" in Pisticci

It has been such a joy to have my house back. No more flinching when I hear a particularly loud bang, no more plaster dropping from my roof into my studio, no more  wondering whether my house would survive - or indeed myself , and no more opening the door and being confronted by scaffolding

I can relax again........

I decided that I need to be nice to my little house and give it some TLC after its distressing experience.

So , I am never going to refer to it in a derogatory fashion again- no more apologising for it being an unrenovated house with a few defects.

Now it's an old and well loved building with a lot of history - which can be seen if you look closely.  It has been here , I think , for hundreds of years and lots of people have lived in it before me and hopefully more will after me.

I am lucky that it is not perfect because then I can be as imaginative as I like with it and I have some crazy plans for future decoration. No limits.

If the walls were perfect then I probably couldn't hang as many paintings on them- but I love living in a gallery and being surrounded by works of arts, portraits of family, old bedspreads. I love lots of colour!

I have so much space to play with and almost every part of the house I have painted or worked on myself or james has fixed is special. My painted fireplace with the roaring fire still makes me smile every time I look at it. The lovely yellow wall in my new sleeping chamber ( sounds more fun than a bed room.)  is a colour I mixed myself after I had been to Florence and seen it in an old cafe with crumbly walls and great atmosphere.

My gallery was painted a sort of orangey terracotta colour one night when I was in the mood for a change and fed up of white.  
The green door was symbolic- not just because it is a traditional colour here, but because I always used to want to blend in and not stand out  and was a bit timid so I changed it from brown to bright green in the hope that my personality would brighten up as well. ( worked a bit...)

Nearly everything in my house has a story.  The crazy tiling in my roman style shower room was decorated with sequins after I had seen a totally weird bathroom in a cafe in Matera.  Or the fridge freezer that a friend gave me several years ago which transformed my shopping life (I can buy ice cream.) and makes me think of her every time I open it.

There are 2 little soft chairs which came with the house, I re-covered them and sometimes I wonder who has sat on them before. They were the first chairs I had ever covered myself. And when I look round I see stories everywhere.

And outside my flowers are back at my door. I have bought some more to celebrate and I managed to save the plant that is growing round my door and  am very proud of it. My first yellow rose is out.(thanks Hans) my fig tree is not dead and quite a few of my plants are getting quite big. I was never a gardener so anything that survives me is a surprise. 

So apologies to my delightful little house/studio/palace and I will  never again refer to it as a shed. I will love the tinkling of raindrops into plastic boxes until I repair the roof again,  I will love the crumbly plaster because it lets me cover it with paintings and bright colours.

And found this old poem

let me grow lovely growing old

so many old things do

laces and ivory and gold

and silks need not be new

and there is healing in old trees

old streets a glamour hold,

why may not I as well as these,grow lovely growing old?

Half a Carnevale.......

I should have known better..............
The Carnevale was to start at 16.00. And I can't help it but be on time..................
So first of all went for a coffee and then after 45mins..... went for a walk.... and then another walk.......and then a prosecco in a circolo.......and then another walk and hey presto only 30 minutes later the carnevale arrived. I found myself a doorstep to stand on from which to take photos and all was going well.... I love  the whole feeling of carnevale, the sheer fun, and exuberance............but I can't cope with the noise- the bass!
So I was happily taking photos until a large lorry thing arrived, bass blasting and I thought I might well die if I didn't get out of the way.
So, unable to find the friends I was with I went home - resolving next year to  not to go on time!!!!
It is such a pity as now I think there is a party- but I am going to bed............must learn to get my timing better...............
However I did get some photos- one of which is really special.

A Very Good Day in Pisticci

It has been ages since I scootered all the way to Marconia but for some reason I decided to give it a go and drop in at the market. It was Saturday after all.
After checking the tyres (it has a slow puncture) I figured I had better go before I changed my mind.
I don't really like the road to marconia: its too narrow and the edges of a lot of the road are broken and full of holes which is quite dangerous for a scooter.
My scooter has in the past had a nasty habit of dying for no particular reason while going up hills and is making a sort of clicking noise at the minute.
However I set off and went relatively slowly  and avoided most of the pot holes, the tyre held out ,the engine kept going and I arrived . On the way I passed an elderly lady on a tricycle who I have seen often with an enormous amount of shopping- and even big heavy tiles on the back of her bike.  She was a bit of an inspiration.
It was a very nice day with a lovely blue sky- so after a coffee to recover from the journey it was great to have a look round the little market, have another coffee, miss the friends I thought I would see and then get back on the scooter and head for home.
It was so much more fun. on the way back  ...I stopped at one of my favourite shops and then at the little wine shop and dawdled back to Pisticci with fingers crossed that the engine would not die on the last hill.
What a wonderfully satisfying experience. May have to repeat it.....
Then the day got even better.
The IMBIANCHINI DI BELLEZZA are back  and painting Pisticci white - bits of it anyways. Was lovely to be part of something again and this time after some light wall painting  someone suggested we go for a walk in the calanche.
Even though I have been here for more than 10 years I didn't know that if I just went down a little road about 100mtrs from my house that it would lead into the calanche. I could attempt to describe what "calanche" are but I can't ,so there are photos. It was like another world.
But not only that .... to go with people who love this and were enthusiastic about their country and knew all about the reasons it was like this was beautiful. I have now realised that not understanding  some of what is said has probably made me more aware of how its said and  people's general attitudes. So I understood some things, didn't say much , but had a wonderful time. On the way back we sat down and waited for sunset.
And I saw fossils- lots of them.....Magical!
I arrived back at my house just as two ladies arrived who then bought a painting which meant a lot to them because of the people in it. It is such a privilege and pleasure to have made something that is special in that way.
Still smiling when I think about it all. It was a very good day indeed.