Ancient Olive Grove

This is a small gouache painting that I completed on location in the final weeks of my stay in Dubrovnik. It is from an ancient olive grove on Lokrum Island that has dozens of these sculptural, twisted olive trees. Peacocks and hens were everywhere in the grove and they will make appearances in future paintings that I create in the studio based on this site.

The Swirling Sea

I mentioned in my last post that I was moving on from within the walls of Old Town Dubrovnik by mid-April since it was getting so crowded. My last month of painting in Dubrovnik was spent mostly on the island of Lokrum; just a short ferry boat ride from the mainland. The variety of scenery was stunning and one of my favorite things to paint there was the rocky beaches the day after a nighttime rain storm. The color was saturated. The sunshine was bright and clean, and yet the sea was still swirling around wildly from the earlier storm. Here are a few small gouache paintings from those sessions.

Old Town in April

This was the last painting that I completed on location in Old Town, Dubrovnik. I could paint there endlessly but at this point (mid-April), the town was being taken over by cruise ships full of tourists. It became difficult to find an area to paint in peace. I must admit though that even that experience was interesting. People were constantly walking past and taking pictures of me painting or more often, leaning over my shoulder and taking a picture of my painting in progress!

Sometimes they would say something to me, occasionally speaking English...most often not. The thing that I enjoy most about Plein Air painting is how all of your senses come into play as you paint. Sights, smells and sounds are locked into my brain from each session.With this piece, I sat in a cool shadow on a low stone step and heard singing coming from a nearby elementary school. All of the children speak primarily Croatian, but they were singing a popular Adele song in English. It sounded beautiful!

Warm & Cool "Street" Light

Here is a small gouache painting that was completed from a high stepped "street" on the extreme west side of Old Town, Dubrovnik. We would probably call these streets... walkways or alleys, but they were designed centuries ago to create maximum shade to provide cool, relief from the extreme heat of Adriatic summers. This creates interesting lighting situations everywhere you look in Old Town. The cool reflected light of the shadows contrasted dramatically with the warm light or hot spots of intense sunlight.

Hilltop Pine

This 5 x 7 gouache painting was done at the top of the hill on Lokrum Island, near Fort Royal. The fort was a gun position left by the Napoleonic French. I sat on a low rock, facing east as I painted this hilltop pine. I started to loosen up a bit here and have some fun with the washes and specks of subtle color. Lokrum is just a short twelve minute boat ride from the Old Town port. It is heavily wooded with rocky beaches and dramatic seas. It became my favorite place to paint while in Dubrovnik and I think that I visited the island about seven or eight times.

Forts and Ports

These are two more small plein air gouache paintings. I lived in Dubrovnik, Croatia for three months while I taught a plein air sketchbook class and I lived right next to the ancient walled city on the Adriatic Sea. There was no shortage of stunning scenery and inspiration. These paintings depict two forts on opposite ends of the city. The top piece is of the Fortress of Lovijenac which is just west of the walls near Pile Gate. The lower piece depicts St. John's Fortress, overlooking the Old Town Harbor near Ploce Gate. Lokrum Island is visible in the background of each painting. Later in this series you will see many pieces from Lokrum Island as it was a major source of inspiration for me in my final months there.

Island Sunset

With this painting, I started to make some changes to my normal working habits. It was still painted on location with gouache, but I started working smaller and also started to use more flat sable brushes. This original is 5" x 7" and I made the decision to work smaller due to the extreme lighting situations that I was encountering. My larger gouache pieces were taking about two hours to complete and within that time frame the light was changing rapidly. I needed to work quicker if I was going to depict the dramatic light that I am drawn to. This is looking west from Lapad just before sunset on the Adriatic Sea.