“The church San Martino a Quona.”
Since I returned from the Italian painting trip, I didn’t have many occasions to paint. I had a bush weekend, going up to midlands for a conference, then I fell ill with a terrible cold, still not fully recovered. And worked further away from home than usual, for the second part of the week. And, on top of that, I started cycling, mostly indoors, on the trainer, because of the beautiful weather.
But I pulled myself together and started painting again, after nearly a week off. Because I still have plenty paintings to finish, from Italy, I decided to complete all the paintings started during the trip, before doing anything new; probably I will start new work sooner than that.
For this week, I decided to finish the painting I started in location at Chiesa (church) San Martino a Quona.
It is a lovely old church, closed to the public at the moment. It belongs now to the I Veroni winery, the place we stayed during the workshop. It is situated about 15 minutes’ walk, uphill from the villa. It was built on the site of the Quona castle, which was destroyed in 1143, by Florentines. It was first attested in 1274.
Amongst other works, in 1745, the sculptor Domenico Ciottoli, had redone the altar and built the two lateral confessionals.
After the 19th century, few alterations were done to the facade, but the 15th century wooden door was kept. Last major restoration took place in 1902.
For the moment, the church doesn’t function as a church and it is closed to the public, awaiting some much-needed restoration works. We were fortunate enough to get access in to the church, being allowed by the winery management to visit it. What a gem! Lovely and cosy little church. There was a story about a ghost, and some of the photos taken by us had a bizarre light in them, but probably just a light effect.
Anyway, back to the painting, I painted it using the same palette with cools and warms, adding some yellow ochre and cadmium yellow deep. No medium, just turps.
To finish it up, I had to check and correct the proportions and the angle of the wall. I then reworked the sky, the distant greens, then the foreground and the wall and finished it with the highlights.
So, here it is:
“The church San Martino a Quona.”
Oil on linen board (Gatorfoam board)
12” X 16” (30 X 40cm).
