Painting Your Heart Out in the Cinque Terre
Native Chattanoogan Durinda Cheek was an artist from early on. At age 4 she drew an entire circus in black crayon on her wallpapered bedroom wall. Her parents then started providing her with drawing supplies including sketchbooks that she promptly filled! As a sophomore in high school, she was selected to the Georgia Governor’s Honors Program in visual arts. She went on to graduate with a BA and MEd in Art education.
Durinda has taught in public and private schools along with teaching as an adjunct professor at local colleges. It was after having a successful solo show at the Chateau Elan outside Atlanta, that she decided to concentrate on her own painting. Watercolor became her choice of media and she went on to be awarded Signature memberships in Georgia, Louisiana, and Tennessee Watercolor Societies. She shows and sells her work in galleries across the southeast and participates in international, national, and regional exhibitions. She was a plein air painter for Walt Disney World’s Flower and Garden Festival for seven years. With her passion of plein air painting, she enjoys participating in Paint Outs held across the country.
Continuing with her love of teaching, Durinda conducts weekly watercolor classes in Chattanooga at Townsend Atelier. She teaches workshops on a regular basis at different locales including Callaway Gardens, Amelia Island, Georgia, and Edisto Island, South Carolina. She has led plein air painting workshops in Italy and France since 2009. She has also taken groups to paint in Monet’s Gardens in Giverny, France.
Durinda believes that there is no better way to live than to combine traveling and painting! You will find you will remember the experiences vividly as you recall your time sketching and painting in “the open air”!
Website: Durinda.com
Email: Durinda@Durinda.com
FB: facebook.com/durinda.cheek
Come and paint the scenes that capture your heart!
Record your impressions of the atmosphere and landscape of the Cinque Terre in sketches and paintings. Durinda will provide a multi-media sketchbook for you to sketch and take notes in.
Irma, watercolor by Durinda
Think of it as a travel journal of your time on the Italian coast. Bring whatever media you are comfortable using. Durinda will demonstrate in watercolor, but pastels, acrylics, gouache, or colored pencils are also recommended. Besides the sketchbook, you will want to bring appropriate paper for your media. You will need to be comfortable and travel light. Just so you know, this is Durinda’s idea of having fun. You never know what you will see or encounter while you are out painting!
We will begin with a morning session at the hotel discussing our materials and tips on capturing a scene using thumb nail sketches. We will talk about our goals for the week. Durinda will share viewfinders with you and show you how best to make a composition. Bring your questions and leave your anxieties behind! She will also talk about how to take photographs that you may want to paint and how to simplify the photograph to make the best composition.
Door with Brass Knockers, watercolor by Durinda
Since Durinda was a school teacher…you will receive a handout of tips for plein air sketching and painting that will include diagrams you may find useful. It will contain tips from the time you see that scene that captures your heart to enlarging the sketch into a painting. During the week, she will explain linear and aerial perspective to help you with creating the atmosphere you are experiencing.
Then we will get all into color: how to mix colors and not get muddy, how to make colors sing in harmony, and how to use color to create mood. We will talk about a limited palette that works. Since we will have access to studio space at our hotel, we may choose to do the larger paintings there after our time out gathering ideas.
Each evening we will meet and discuss our day, show our works, and share our thoughts. This is your time to take in this part of Italy that will capture your heart!!
Additional Activities: Our daily painting will be combined with other adventures such as:
- train pass to visit other towns (Vernazza, Riomaggiore, Manarola and Corniglia)
- boat trip to Porto Venere to sketch or photograph from the sea
- free shuttle service from the hotel to the main town
- transfers to/from Florence on the first/last day
The Cinque Terre – is a rugged portion of coast on the Italian Riviera. “The Five Lands” comprises five villages: Monterosso al Mare, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola, and Riomaggiore. Paths, trains and boats connect the villages, and cars cannot reach them from the outside. For more about the Cinque Terre, the Lonely Planet gives a nice description with photos: http://www.lonelyplanet.com/italy/cinque-terre
The Food – We will have 5 dinners organized together at local restaurants and trattorie. We’ll sample the pastas, seafood and specialties of the area. Wine is included in all meals. Lunches and 2 dinners will be independent for you to explore the local cuisine on your own.
Given its location on the Mediterranean, seafood is plentiful in the local cuisine. Anchovies of Monterosso are a local specialty designated with a Protected Designation of Origin status from the European Union. The mountainsides of the Cinque Terre are heavily terraced and are used to cultivate grapes and olives. This area, and the region of Liguria, as a whole, is known for pesto — a sauce made from basil leaves, garlic, salt, olive oil, pine nuts and pecorino cheese. Focaccia is a particularly common locally baked bread product. Farinata is also a typical snack found in bakeries and pizzerias — essentially it is a savoury and crunchy pancake made from a base of chick-pea flour.
Price: $3,795 p/p based on private single room
Optional Supplements:
- $250 p/p discount for a shared double room
- $275 p/p for suite with Jacuzzi and terrace, minimum 2 people
Includes:
- Private room in Hotel La Cabana in Monterosso
- Daily traditional breakfast
- 5 dinners with wine
- Daily painting classes and critiques with Durinda
- Train passes for exploring other towns
- One boat trip on the Mediterranean
- Pick up from and return to Florence train station on arrival and departure days (NOTE: if you are traveling on from Monterosso and would prefer not to return to Florence, there is a convenient train station right in town.)
Does Not Include:
- Airfare
- Lunch
- Art supplies
- Gratuities – at your discretion at the end of the week, but this is always greatly appreciated by your program manager
- Independent meals and sight-seeing
To Register: just click on the Sign Up Now button. A non-refundable deposit of $500 is required to secure your spot in the workshop. Payment can be made on line with a credit card, or you can follow the instructions to send in your registration and payment by mail. Once we receive your deposit we will send you a formal Registration Confirmation with further information about the program. You will receive 2-3 other correspondences by email prior to the workshop with information about Italy, a supplies list and an electronic invoice for the balance. Final Balance is due by August 1st. Any time prior to your arrival, if you have questions about anything regarding the trip or the program, you can contact us by email or phone and we’ll be happy to assist you.
Contact us for more information: info@ilchiostro.com or speak to us live at 800-990-3506.
Our small hotel La Cabana sits on a small hill that divides the historic center of Monterosso from the new part, Fegina. It is a typical Ligurian farmhouse that has belonged to one family for generations. The vines and the olive trees that they have cultivated form the backdrop to the rooms that have been recently refurbished with the utmost respect for the environment and the traditions of the Cinque Terre, but without forgetting modern comforts.
The 9 rooms are furnished with antiques, parquet floors, curtains, and finishes intended to frame the unparalleled panoramic view of the Mediterranean Sea. It is an oasis of relaxation completely surrounded by greenery and silence with wonderful vistas and gardens to paint. Our group will take over the entire hotel for the week.
To get down to Monterosso you can take advantage of their free shuttle service or, if you are up for it, walking down is not difficult and takes less than ten minutes. It’s a nice walk down that offers beautiful panoramic views. On the descent, you will pass the ancient 11th century castle (today houses the cemetery of the village) and wind through olive trees until you reach the historical center of town. Coming back up, the shuttle might be a good idea!
For more information, visit their web site: http://www.lacabanacinqueterre.com/en/index.php
Breakfast room
Reception
Entrance to La Cabana
Garden overlooking the town
The terrace
View from the terrace
La Cabana shuttle
The Cinque Terre are in the section of Italy known as Liguria on the western coast. The main city of Liguria is Genova. These 5 towns were traditional fishing villages, cut off from the mainland by a steep range of mountains. For centuries they were only accessible by the sea.
For our program, we will meet the group in Florence on the first day. From there a private bus will take the group to our hotel in Monterosso-al-Mare.
To visit the town from our hotel there is a regular shuttle bus. The towns are small with narrow roads, so the shuttle will leave us off in the newer section, then we will walk through a short tunnel to the historic center of town where most of the shops and restaurants are located.
To go between towns (Vernazza, Manarola, Corniglia or Rio Maggiore) there are local trains connecting all of them.
5 Terre fishing boat, photo by Andy Holtzman
The Cinque Terre – is a rugged portion of coast on the Italian Riviera. “The Five Lands” comprises five villages: Monterosso al Mare, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola, and Riomaggiore. Paths, trains and boats connect the villages, and cars cannot reach them from the outside.
For more about the Cinque Terre, the Lonely Planet gives a nice description with photos: http://www.lonelyplanet.com/italy/cinque-terre
The Food: Given its location on the Mediterranean, seafood is plentiful in the local cuisine. Anchovies of Monterosso are a local specialty designated with a Protected Designation of Origin status from the European Union. The mountainsides of the Cinque Terre are heavily terraced and are used to cultivate grapes and olives. This area, and the region of Liguria, as a whole, is known for pesto — a sauce made from basil leaves, garlic, salt, olive oil, pine nuts and pecorino cheese. Focaccia is a particularly common locally baked bread product. Farinata is also a typical snack found in bakeries and pizzerias — essentially it is a savoury and crunchy pancake made from a base of chick-pea flour. Epic porcini mushrooms are presented in a wooden box for you to chose for grilling with olive oil and garlic.
