Honeymoon and Hotels: Il Gatto Bianco

I told you previously that the views of Capri, particularly from our room at the Hotel Gatto Bianco, had all proved a little overwhelming. That is why, when I ventured out onto our balcony for the first time, and being quite unable to decide which view to capture, I turned one way and made a sketch, and 180 degrees to the other to create this painting. Created using my favourite holiday medium of gouache on paper, this view becomes the latest addition to my collection of Honeymoon and Hotels gouaches.

Capturing both the dense mass of houses and rooftops, alongside the ravishing view of Capri’s most famous Faraglioni rocks, this painting is for me as typical a depiction of Capri as one could get. For it is filled with joy, colour and flowers – the same flowers which fell, cascaded, covered and sprung up all over this island of holiday happiness, a land so entrenched in hedonism and chic that even the most perfumed manifestations of nature’s best blooms race to find a home there.

Flowers and Faraglioni: View from the Hotel Gatto Bianco (© 2019 Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, gouache on paper)

However perhaps my favourite feature of this painting is also my favourite element of the room itself –  those multicoloured, hand-painted majolica floor tiles which characterised the rooms of the Hotel Gatto Bianco, and which are present throughout the Amalfi Coast. It’s so refreshing to enjoy such tiles which, although devoid of imperfections, are evidentially hand-painted, and all the more beautiful because of it. I can genuinely share the pain of their creator –  this small representation of the type caused me no end of back pain, such was the meticulous detail required. I can only imagine how laborious the work must be when multiplied across 100s and 1000s of tiles. Yet the result is an interior utterly imbued with the spirit of the Mediterranean, and of the stunning island of Capri.

© Nicholas de Lacy-Brown and The Daily Norm, 2019. Unauthorised use and/or duplication of the material, whether written work, photography or artwork, included within The Daily Norm without express and written permission from The Daily Norm’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited.