Marc Dalessio

I had intended on focusing more on my teaching this year. All things considered however, I still managed to get a lot done.

I’m quite pleased with my Florentine paintings this year. For years I haven’t painted seriously in the city as I felt somewhat bored of the views I see everyday. Then I got a commission to paint Piazza Tasso, which is not considered the most beautiful piazza in Florence, but it has a special meaning to me so I was very happy to be asked to capture it on canvas. Here is an image: 

The painting was quite successful (I felt, and the clients were happy). An antiquarian saw this in a small show I had and asked me to do a series of ‘unusual’ Florentine scenes for a show this October. The work is at the photographers at the moment, but I’ll try to post more when the images come back. The gallery website would not appear to be up and running at the moment…

I’ve been trying to work larger outdoors. With today’s modern conveniences, we should have less trouble moving our equipment around. I was always impressed with the photos of Sorolla painting on his massive canvases with large wooden structures to protect them from the wind.

My idea now is to have an easel made that I can attach to the side of my car. I already use the car all the time as a windbreak as it is so tall, now I just need a way to attach a canvas to the side…

Here is an image of the final painting:

I spend a lot of time driving around the Tuscan countryside every summer looking for great spots to paint.

An ongoing project of mine is to take a picture from every spot I find which I think is especially picturesque. The camera on my cellphone is set to automatically check the built-in gps system to see where I am in the world, and the phone is set to automatically upload my landscape photos to a Flickr set. Flickr can then parse the location data in the photo and place it on a map.

Another painter can then check my ‘landscape archive’ map on Flickr to see if any of the views interest them.

At the moment there are just a few practice shots up, but over the next couple months the map should fill up.

(The phone is a Nokia N82, if anyone was curious).

This is a project I’ve wanted to work on for a while. An outdoor, full length self-portrait at midday in the summer. Lots of light everywhere.

At the moment I’m working on the composition and trying to figure out problems which will arise with the larger version.

Here are some early photos (cellphone camera):