Sketching outdoors in Italy was always a bit of a challenge. Even if I thought I was out in the middle of nowhere, people would come out of their homes to see what I was doing in the middle of their field. Not that they would be upset, they were merely curious and would talk or invite me in for coffee and my plans to work would slip away. When I began in earnest to prepare a portfolio, my friends at the Baldelli horse farm happily allowed me to roam their fields and olive groves so I could paint and sketch in peace.
These postcard sized watercolor sketches show rows of young olive trees under a hot July sun. The small study of an olive tree that had been pruned back: the shadows on the trunk and the leaves on the one arching branch fascinated me.
