Plein Air in the Maremma 2011: Ellen

This year I think I'll do use a different method to document what happens during a workshop: each person's progress will chronicled, showing his or her week's opus.

Ellen has been a very loyal student to our art program; she has taken many lessons from the Wallkill River School, Billy Noonan and workshops through Tuscany: A Journey for the Senses, to name a few.

Here's a sampling of her week's progress:

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Plein Air in the Maremma 2011: Day 1

Once again, Laura Martinez-Bianco and Billy Noonan arrived here in Tuscany to teach painting. This week-long class will be in the Maremma, a more wild area of Tuscany than most we have been to. However, the landscape views are lovely.

We are staying Podere Carceroni, which is located outside of a tiny hamlet called Poggi del Sasso. It is owned and run by Valeria and Maurizio, who have their winter home in Milan. Valeria is originally from Rome and has studied architecture, cooking, and art. They restored a ruin of stone farmhouse (actually, just a pile of stones) over a period of 4 long years and opened up for business as a B&B in 2010. We are enjoying the fruits of their labors, even in the intense July 2011 summer heat!

Here are some of photos of the podere: