Day 20 of 30

Malbork Castle

6 x 6

Acrylic on Canvas Paper

Poland is an amazing country full of beautiful architecture but what I remember the most is the 13th century castle Malbork, the largest castle in the world.  The design in astounding in that it has heated floors, secret passageways from kitchen to dining halls for transport of food and bathroom facilities that are removed from the living space and act as escape routes.  It is enormous and I can now see how a city can thrive within the walls.

Jail for the wealthy

Day 11 Jail

6 x 6

acrylic on canvas

San Marino, a tiny republic state within Italy has three towers in it's hilltop city of the same name and the above painting is of a jail for the wealthy in one of the towers.  For a sum of money one can enjoy the view for your final days on earth although you have to put up with a wet floor when it rains!

What I've learned so far...

Day 10 Castle Tower

6 x 6

Acrylic on Canvas

One third of the way through Leslie Saeta's 30 paintings in 30 days Challenge (see sidebar) and I'm still hanging in there.   A few things that are becoming clear:

I'm an oil painter - acrylics are only for speed and ease of correction but will not be my medium of choice.

I can easily stay on track with a simple daily plan and minimal distractions.  This involves choosing the subject to be painted the night before and getting the preparations done so that in the morning I can immediately get to work.

I'm going to have more than minimal distractions - that's life.

I like to paint bigger, much bigger.

I'm not a daily painter  - there is way to much else to do in life and I want to do it all!