Good times

 At the Chateau   Laurie Fox Pessemier   Acrylic/linen  13 x 16"  33 x 41 cm

 Ducks in the Seine   Blair Pessemier   Acrylic/panel  9.5 x 14"  24 x 35 cm

 Peniche on the river   Laurie Fox Pessemier  Acrylic/linen  11 x 16"  27 x 41 cm

 Louvre  Blair Pessemier   Acrylic/linen  13 x 16"  33 x 41 cm

 Seine   Blair Pessemier   Acrylic/linen  11 x 14  27 x 35cm

 Man with Pipe/Woman with Camera  Laurie Fox Pessemier  Acrylic/linen  12 x 12"  30 x 30 cm

 Girl on the Path   Laurie Fox Pessemier   Acrylic/linen  9.5 x 13"  x 33cm

 June Balustrade   Blair Pessemier   Acrylic/panel  9.5 x 14"  24 x 35 cm

Garden 29 June    Blair Pessemier  Acrylic/linen  12 x 12   30 x 30 cm

“Keep left then bear right”, our GPS ordered as we negotiated a winding country road.  We took a wrong turn, the machine froze.  Behind the technology wave, we still use our portable GPS plugged into the cigarette lighter of the rental car. The GPS works, at least most of the time.  

This week’s workshops took us to a remote chateau, an hour north of Paris.  A family, 18, wanted to paint –we ended up with 8 serious painters.    They were the COOLest of clients – a super fabulous chateau, artists between the ages of 6 and 60, painting on the terrace, and lunch.  Our client was a journalist, and we talked about right and wrong, and what mattered.  Wonderful stuff.

We had a painter this week from Detroit, two from Canada, two from Texas, a five-day workshop with someone from South Carolina, and today, Sunday, a really great young painter from Philadelphia.  We are exhausted, but I feel we are hitting our stride.    I am really enjoying painting with such a variety of people – our own paintings are here and there – I try to find new ways to look at the same scene.

The last two days have been cold and rainy – we’re painting under the bridge, near the Seine; in the pavilion at the Luxembourg Gardens.   Our young painter painted me as a second subject:  hat and raincoat.

Our five day workshop is on the modified American  plan (does anyone remember going on vacation that way?  Here in France we call it demi-pension:  one meal a day at our house).   June and July are the months we have all of our guests, it seems.  We are drinking champagne and eating  hors d'oeuvres, letting the good times roll.