AN ARTIST'S RESPONSE part 2

Like most of us. I've been trying to come to terms with this

plague we are all suffering through.

I try to do it with paint.

PAINTING IN PROGRESS

Basket of Fruit and Vegetables ( in progress)

James Aponovich

Oil on canvas, 26" x 26"

It is very important to establish a solid foundation.

For this painting it means building a strong structure that will carry the

brilliance of the fruit and vegetables. That means paying a lot of

attention to how the basket and cloth are painted against a

dark background. It's been a struggle, but I have the time.

P.I.P. Painting in Purgatory.....week 5 / Painting in Progress

STILL LIFE WITH THREE GROUPS OF FLOWERS

(and Lots of Cloth)

Painting-In-Progress

James Aponovich

DEEP IN THE WEEDS

This week has been the week of never-ending fabric.....

Everyday, all day .

Cloth Before 

Cloth After

YELLOW

THE CELESTIAL COLOR

In Ancient China if you as a Commoner dared wear yellow you could be rewarded by

having your head cut off, immediately. It is Heaven's color and only

The Emperor was allowed to wear it. So it's best not to add it to your wardrobe.

Yellow is very difficult to control. It rises to the most brilliant light

and it sinks to a muddy dark mess. No other color is as hard to handle.

You know a beautiful yellow when you see it, and a bad yellow screams.

So, with all this yellow on my hands I turn to it's opposite, violet

for some counter balance. And since the yellow wants to go green, 

I must choose red-violet.

Still Life with Three Groups of Flowers ( in-progress)

James Aponovich

oil on canvas, 40" x 52"

Until next week................

copyright 2019 James Aponovich

all rights reserved

P.T.P. / PAST THE POINT OF NO RETURN... week 4

STILL LIFE WITH THREE GROUPS OF FLOWERS ( and stuff)
James Aponovich

PAINTING IN PROGRESS
week 4

Before

After


It's Halftime but no break here. The canvas is covered with paint.
All the elements are at least sketched in, others further along.
At this point....

 "It is what it is."
- B. Belichick

This week I will paint the cloth in...not so easy...the 'fun' part is over.

Town sketched


The landscape is just emerging. It's Italy for sure, but more of
a composite of various places that have played an influential role
in my life; Val D'Orcia, the Tuscan Garfangnana, and of course, our
home, Umbria.

Town finished

My fanciful take on 'Our Town', Panicale, overlooking
Lake Trasimeno.

Looks like the Wolfman ( Goethe) was right with the Primary Chord
of yellow (cloth), blue (vase), and red (raspberries)
balanced by green.
Red tends to want to be the Schoolyard Bully so it's best to
use it sparingly. It has quite a punch, a little goes a long way.

Still Life with Three Groups of Flowers ( in progress)
James Aponovich
oil on canvas




Until next week......

AT LAST, A TRIP TO ANGHIARI and THE BUSATTI FACTORY

James and I had been wanting to make a trip up to Anghiari (Tuscany) to the Busatti Factory for several years, and, at last this past spring we set out on a day trip from Panicale, after cappuccini at Bar Gallo, with our visiting friends Debbie and Jim.

Busatti tessuti

Here it is, the Busatti factory, a destination that we finally reached, OH ! What a glorious sight it was to see the BUSATTI sign. A thought crossed my mind.....Yikes, what if it is closed? Which can happen in Italy.  But, to our good fortune they were open!!


THE BUSATTI SHOP

 Walking through the door you find a shop that is filled, and I do mean filled with Busatti fabric, bolts stacked proud, shelf upon shelf.

Throughout the shop there are tables set with fine Busatti  tablecloths and napkins. There are also "rooms" with beds draped and pillowed with beautiful duvet covers, coverlets, shams, and of course,  I wanted to buy it all!!!

But we came on a mission. Our goal was to buy enough of a particular fabric for our dining room window panels. It is a golden cloth we purchased about ten years ago at the Busatti shop in Arezzo. James has used many times in his paintings, but the piece he has, and continues to use, does have its share of paint stains on it!

North Wind Clearing
James Aponovich
oil on canvas

Here is the cloth that we are hoping Busatti still makes....that is why we are here.
Easy to forget our mission when surrounded by so many beautiful fabrics.

And then there was a subtle noise that grew louder in another show room.
Debbie and I wondered, Hmmmm, was that the sound of the factory looms?


THE BUSATTI FACTORY

There was a kind woman helping us in our quest. As luck would have it, Debbie had an image on her phone of one of the paintings James did that included the fabric. YAY!
Yes, they still made the fabric. The thing about Busatti fabric is it very wide. We ordered what we needed and we had it shipped.

Still curious about the factory, I asked , and our kind sales person  who then offered us a tour.

The fabric, wool, linen, hemp and cotton are woven on shuttle looms that are over  a century old.
Busatti / Sassolini families have been making fabrics here since 1847.

One of the weavers carefully tying ends of this blue and white cloth.

We all found this fascinating, the way the threads were being fed to the loom. Jim noticed the brown paper like thing hanging on the right of the loom and asked about them. Seems these rolls have a series of punctures which are a "pattern code" for the particular fabric that is being created on the shuttle loom. Each Busatti fabric has one of these pattern code rolls. Think about a player piano and the rolls that make the music, and you will understand how these pattern codes work.

There was a hallway filled with boxes of these colorful spools of thread for weaving these incredible woven fabrics.

Still life with spools!
If they had these for sale in the store I would have bought a few!

James and I couldn't get enough of these. The colors were so pure and fanciful.

The part of the factory was small, basement like, at least the part we visited. We imagined a much larger operation. We were glad to have seen these remarkable looms and watch a person passing the shuttle through the threads to create the patterns.

As we were leaving the factory we passed a room with bolts of tagged fabrics.
I just liked the way all of these bolts looked.




Back upstairs to the quiet to the shop, those shuttle looms do make quite a rumble, might even say thunderous!

One of the tablecloths in the shop, that was part of a table setting.

I stopped to buy a few napkins, how could I resist?

We said goodbye and headed out for a quick look at Anghiari and for some lunch.


THE STREETS of ANGHIARI

Anghiari is also known because of Leonardo Da Vinci. There was a battle fought  here in 1440.
There are several drawing by Leonardo ( 1505) of this battle, and it is thought by some that he did a painting of it. "The Lost Leonard" of The Battle of Anghiari, might be in the Palazzo Vecchio, on Florence, on a wall that was covered over and a fresco then painted in 1563 by Vasari.
It remains an art mystery.

It was only a few days after we arrived home to New Hampshire that a box arrived from Busatti.

Our fabric arrived. It is perfectly beautiful. Now, we must have it made into curtains for our dining room.


BUSATTI
Via Mazzini 14
Anghiari

www.busatti.com

Busatti has shops throughout Italy and around the world.