Skip to content

Posts tagged ‘Amalfi’

Feb 23

Interpretation No. 12 – Capuchin Monks, Amalfi

The heady days of Amalfi coast indulgence are now too many days behind me to count – it must be at least 250 rather forlorn days since I sampled the paradise of Amalfi, Capri and Positano during a blissful week on the Italian coast last summer. And it has been almost as long since I last thought to paint the place, even though it was on my hotel balcony on the Amalfi Coast that my collection of interpretations began. It was therefore something of a blast from the past when, opening up sketch book the other day in order to start a new gouache project, I discovered a half finished gouache painting based on the Amalfi Coast, left sadly uncompleted.

My feeling with paintings is that each painting has its time, and even when a project goes unworked for some time, it should always be left until the time is again right to continue it. A painting should never be destined for the bin. So when I reopened this hitherto unfinished work, I so enjoyed the breath of fresh Italian air that gushed open my opening it that I decided that the time was right to finish it off, even if it meant completing the Amalfi scene here in my new home of Mallorca.

Interpretation No. 12: Capuchin Monks, Amalfi (2014-15 © Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, gouache on paper)

Interpretation No. 12: Capuchin Monks, Amalfi (2014-15 © Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, gouache on paper)

The painting, which will be the 12th in my collection of gouache interpretative landscapes, was actually based on an old engraving we picked up in Amalfi just before catching a boat back home to Positano. Being a city renowned for its ancient homemade papers, we could not resist buying a print on Amalfi’s finest, and as soon as we found this image, I was captivated. There was something about the alluring tranquil activity of the Capuchin monks depicted, one tying back a vine and the other reading before a view of Amalfi, that made me want to recreate this idyllic scene of the joie de vivre for modern times.

The original engraving we purchased in Amalfi (c. 1880, artist unknown)

The original engraving we purchased in Amalfi (c. 1880, artist unknown)

A gouache interpretation was born and now, thanks to my rediscovery of the image, it is completed. I am pleased with the relative simplification I have achieved by repainting the scene in broad flat gouache colours, and I have to say that the colour has certainly brought this 19th century engraving back to life. It could almost be modern day except that, sadly (or not for those rich enough to stay there), the Capuchin Monastery of Amalfi is today the swish Gran Hotel Convento di Amalfi, a place from which this view can still be very much enjoyed, albeit sadly without the monks.

© Nicholas de Lacy-Brown and The Daily Norm, 2001-2015. Unauthorized 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. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Nicholas de Lacy-Brown and The Daily Norm with appropriate and specific direction to the original content. For more information on the work of Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, head to his art website at www.delacy-brown.com

Dec 31

9 Comments

2014: My year in photos

It has become something of a tradition on The Daily Norm to spend the last day of the year looking back at photos capturing the 364 days before it, reflecting on all of the splendid and captivating sights which have made up the year. And perhaps more than any other that has gone before, 2014 has been a year which the camera has loved. For when I look back at my photos of the last 12 months, I am met with an overwhelming body of diverse and beautiful shots which encapsulate a year overflowing with incredible sights and experiences.

I count myself very lucky to have seen and experienced all that has passed in a single year. From the quaint dark streets of Barcelona in February, my travels took me to the incredibly unique medieval citadel of Dubrovnik, the jaw-droppingly beautiful Amalfi Coast (including Positano, Ravello and Capri), the inspiringly-vertiginous mountain town of Ronda in Southern Spain, the vine-rich planes of coastal Tuscany, the floral festival of Pilar in Zaragoza, and the much applauded Czechoslovakian beauty that is Prague. And travels asides, it was the year when I held my first solo art exhibition in 6 years – a huge amount of work which dominated the first half of the year, but a wonderfully satisfying artistic and commercial success which will mark out this year as a creatively significant one.

The famous clock of Capri's main piazza

The ultimate ripples, Palma de Mallorca

Paradise on earth - Capri

Floral walkway, Positano

Colour profile, Marbella

Grape harvest in Castagneto Carducci

Beach umbrellas, Positano

However, appearances can be misleading, and when I look back on these photos, in particular those taken while travelling around Europe, I remember those holidays as escapes into unreality, moments of happiness snatched and nourished in between a stark reality which was becoming more and more difficult to endure. Once my exhibition was over, I found myself faced with a career which failed to inspire me, a city which made life a daily grind, and my partner feeling increasingly depressed for the same reasons. And it was this realisation, and a very unique opportunity that came from it, which triggered perhaps the most significant of all experiences that 2014 brought: our move to Mallorca. A life changer on so many levels; a bundle of new experiences which have only just begun.

And so it is sitting here in sunny Mallorca that I make this review, delightedly gathering up my memories of the year full of the positivity which has accompanied our move to a new life in Spain. Fast forward 365 days, and I look forward to telling you all about it.

Happy New Year to you all!

All photos and written content are strictly the copyright of Nicholas de Lacy-Brown © 2014 and The Daily Norm. All rights are reserved. Unauthorized 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.

Jul 23

1 Comment

Art-in-Amalfi – Painting 6: Arrival in Amalfi

On the Amalfi Coast you really are spoilt for choice. Not only is the coast a veritable paradise of high end shops, hotels and restaurants, but from every angle there is a new and stunning view to pop your eyes pen a little wider with pleasure. As both an Artist and keen photographer, this was both a treat and a burden, for every time I opened my eyes, I saw something incredibly beautiful, and started feeling guilty if I did not capture it in some form. So it was that on a short 45 minute boat ride from Positano to Amalfi I found myself unable to sit still, unsure whether to look backwards out of the boat towards the fading but ever beautiful view of the pastel-coloured town on the magnificent mountainside, look over the side to the similarly nestled hilltop town of Praiano, or forwards, towards the glittering town of Amalfi.

Well the answer to this quandary was that I did all three. Having had my fill of Positano (if that is even possible…) I then turned towards white-gleaming Praiano (and later painted it as Amalfi Coast painting no.5) and then turned my attention towards the grand town of Amalfi which our boat was fast approaching. This painting, my 6th of the holiday and another in the series of cubic simplifications by which I am delineating the houses and structures of the coast, captures the moment when we approached the town, when the gleaming gold facade of the cathedral could be seen flanked my buildings sweeping up the steadily sloping valley on either side. Meanwhile in the background one could just about make out the promised land of Ravello, a town we were to visit later that day.

Amalfi (2014 © Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, gouache on paper)

Amalfi (2014 © Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, gouache on paper)

More about that, tomorrow.

© Nicholas de Lacy-Brown and The Daily Norm, 2001-2014. Unauthorized 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. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Nicholas de Lacy-Brown and The Daily Norm with appropriate and specific direction to the original content. For more information on the work of Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, head to his art website at www.delacy-brown.com

Jul 22

1 Comment

Positano & beyond | Amalfi

We had been some time on Italy’s stunning Amalfi Coast before we actually visited the town of Amalfi itself. Or perhaps I should call it a city, for Amalfi is a place rich in maritime history left over from a time when it was as important on the trading map as Venice and Genoa. Today however it is a mere shadow of its former glory – small in size and population, but still retaining all the highlights of its historical magnificence. 

We set out to Amalfi one stormy morning from Positano, after a night when humid thunderstorms had tried to break through the sauna of heat clinging to the mountain sides down by the sea. However within the 45 minutes of our boat journey along the coast, the clouds were already rolling away, and the arrival of the sun coincided perfectly with our arrival into Amalfi, it’s magnificent gold tiled Duomo reflecting the sun like a lone diamond and glinting visibly all the way out to sea. 

Journey and arrival…

DSC03208 DSC03239 DSC03280 DSC03292

As the boat docked on Amalfi’s busy quayside it was already obvious that the town had a much more tangibly urban feel than little Positano. Along the seafront, larger ornate apartment blocks stood proudly like the kind usually found in Rome or Naples; in its port boats glided in and out with greater regularity and purposefulness; and in its squares, crowds bustled in a way which inferred that real life was going on here, as well as tourism. 

The streets of Amalfi

DSC03936 DSC03927 DSC03902 DSC03889 DSC03888 DSC03874 DSC03388 DSC03377 DSC03365 DSC03335 DSC03321 DSC03903 DSC03332 DSC03331 DSC03314 DSC03383 DSC03342 DSC03324

Read more

Jul 8

2 Comments

My travel sketchbook: Positano 2 – View from the Beach

You will have seen from yesterday’s Positano beach post just how incredible the views of the town were from the average sunbed on its wide pebbly beach. They were indeed the same views that inspired my first gouache painting of the holiday (posted last week). The views were so good in fact that it felt sinful to simply lie out on a lounger, eyes closed against the sun, ignoring the view. Rather, not only did I feel compelled to keep my eyes on the view for fear of wasting such an incredible sight, but I also felt the inspiration rise within me to sketch it.

And so, stretched out on a beach lounger, a glass of wine in one hand and a pen in the other, I set about sketching this very detailed but fairly quick impression of the town of Positano – the gem of the Amalfi coast. Unlike my gouache interpretation of the same scene, this sketch is more fastidious in capturing the details of Positano’s buildings, and all of their details – windows, balconies, garden terraces and so on. But devoid of the pastel shades contrasting against the grey-purple and forest green backdrop of the mountain, the whole architectural force of Positano appears to melt more permissively into the mountainside, as though nature and mankind have become a single inseparable form. And it’s a beautiful form to behold, both in reality and, I think, on the pages of my sketchbook.

Positano Sketch 2 - View from the beach (2014 © Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, pen on paper)

Positano Sketch 2 – View from the beach (2014 © Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, pen on paper)

© Nicholas de Lacy-Brown and The Daily Norm, 2001-2014. Unauthorized 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. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Nicholas de Lacy-Brown and The Daily Norm with appropriate and specific direction to the original content. For more information on the work of Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, head to his art website at www.delacy-brown.com

Jul 3

11 Comments

Art-in-Amalfi – Painting 1: Positano I (viewed from the beach)

Having seen my post of photos on yesterday’s Daily Norm, and perhaps even my photos of the incredible views which we were lucky enough to enjoy for our week’s stay at the Palazzo Talamo Hotel, you will easy to understand why I was inspired to create by the town of Positano on Italy’s Amalfi Coast. Not only is the town a picture perfect dazzlement of beautiful houses clustered against a vast imposing mountain backdrop, but it is also a riot of pastel colours in an otherwise natural landscape of verdant greenery and sheer greyish purple rock. The most striking thing about Positano is the fact that the small town appears to defy nature as a small cluster of dwellings clinging, almost like limpits, to the sheer side of the otherwise inhospitable mountain sides. The effect is a stark and beautiful contrast between the man-made regularised geometric forms of buildings and the irregular looming presence of the nature-made mountains, and it was this contrast which struck me the most as I set about painting my first homage to the town.

Positano I (viewed from the beach) (2014 © Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, gouache on paper)

Positano I (viewed from the beach) (2014 © Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, gouache on paper)

Stretched out on the beach a day after our arrival, I started work on this piece: Positano I (viewed from the beach). Using simplified geometric forms and stripping away all of the details which otherwise characterise the houses and hotels of Positano (windows, balconies and so on), this painting purposefully reduces the buildings of Positano to their most basic cubic form in order to emphasise the contrast between rigid geometry and rugged mountain, all the while expressing the beauty of Positano’s very colourful cluster of houses. The result is a painting I love. Made in gouache on paper, for me its colours and sunshine brightness sum up the mediterranean mood, while the geometric gathering of cubes echoes the shape of this small town which makes it so unique on much publicised postcards and travel guides throughout the world.

As with all of my travel-inspired art works, this painting gave me great satisfaction to create, all the more so because it was started on the beach and completed on my balcony with a view. Now who can ask for a better  art studio than that?

© Nicholas de Lacy-Brown and The Daily Norm, 2001-2014. Unauthorized 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. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Nicholas de Lacy-Brown and The Daily Norm with appropriate and specific direction to the original content. For more information on the work of Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, head to his art website at www.delacy-brown.com

Jul 2

5 Comments

Positano & beyond | Photos Part 2 – Down into the town

On Monday I shared a collection of photos showing the dazzling views of the seashore and the vast mountains of the Amalfi Coast which greeted us from a hotel balcony every time we awoke and entered our bedroom at the Palazzo Talamo Hotel in Positano, Italy. And this was just for starters. Up in the hotel, on the meandering upper road which snakes its way across the mountain sides and over the town, we were approximately 300 steep steps (or a longer sloped descent) away from the bustling centre of Positano, and if we thought the views from up there had stolen the show in the beauty stakes, Positano’s beachside centre was about to show how it too could take centre stage.

One writer (who shall remain unnamed) in my Rough Guides travel guide to the Amalfi Coast maintained that Positano was unfavourably given over to tourism and lacked authenticity. That writer has either never been to this picture-perfect gem of the Italian coast, or is just plain foolish. Of course, Positano has its fair share of souvenir shops given over to sales of limoncello and beautifully hand crafted pottery, but what shop on the Amalfi Coast doesn’t, when the beauty of its landscape is so obviously going to pull in and ravish tourist hoards in their turn? But in Positano, those same shops are nestled together in a cluster of pastel coloured houses which almost glow by contrast with the dark mountains looming behind them, and which, at ground level, are so small and quaint, situated in tiny little lanes covered from the sun with vibrant pink bougainvillea, that at every turn there is another photograph begging to be taken.

DSC02042 DSC02045 DSC02065 DSC02297 DSC02033

So this post of photos moves from our hotel’s coastal panoramas to the finer details of the town centre itself. From groups of children dancing, to locals chatting over a stall selling granita de limon, and from the brightly coloured tiled dome of the duomo to the vivid stripes of the umbrellas lined up along the wide pebbly beach: these photos show a town which is bursting with the spirit of Italia, and is certainly far from the inauthenticity which Rough Guides has alleged. Picture-perfect houses and a landscape to die for; a beach side paseo bustling with locals and tourists; little shopping streets with their wares almost falling out onto the street like in nearby Naples, and a central core with a grand church at its centre – Positano for me is the very epitome of the Italian dream – an almost fiction-like paradise whose reality is ever questionable – close your eyes before it and you may realise you were simply dreaming.

All photos and written content are strictly the copyright of Nicholas de Lacy-Brown © 2014 and The Daily Norm. All rights are reserved. Unauthorized 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.

Jul 1

4 Comments

My travel sketchbook: Positano 1 – Balcony View

It was only around 5 weeks ago that I was lucky enough to spend a long weekend in the Croatian jewel of Dubrovnik, and there to open the pages of my brand new leather backed moleskin sketchbook and begin covering those pages with pen sketches. There is nothing quite so nice for me as making sketches on the spot, particularly of views from cafes and piazzas, on bustling beaches and of stunning views, because unlike the process of taking a quick photo, the duration and experience of making a sketch makes the process more memorable, and the resulting image far more rich and rewarding. I’ve already shared with you some of the sketches which came out of my Dubrovnik trip, and now I am delighted to be able to share some of the works which have come out of my visit to Italy’s Amalfi Coast.

Following in the tradition of my Norm Sketches, I tend to create my sketches using a fineliner pen rather than the more traditional pencil or charcoal. I find the permanence of pen sketches more attractive, and the depth of black that can be achieved more dramatic. It does however mean that there is no scope whatsoever for mistake, and so very often artistic license takes the place of reality when inevitable errors have to be “corrected” such as to salvage the whole work. This may mean that a few buildings come out a bit wonky, but I enjoy this aspect of the “hand made” about a sketch (and indeed a painting). After all, if you want photographic perfection then you may as well take a photo.

Positano Sketch 1: Balcony View towards the Sirenuse (2014 © Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, pen on paper)

Positano Sketch 1: Balcony View towards the Sirenusas (2014 © Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, pen on paper)

My first sketch is of our base on the Amalfi Coast, Positano, and more particularly one part of the stunning 180 degree panorama we enjoyed from our hotel room with a view. This sketch captures the view looking Westwards towards the tiny group of Sirenusas islands (otherwise known as the Li Galli) which can be seen on the horizon of the sketch. That little archipelago is named after the Sirens of Homer’s Odyssey, as they are reputed to be the location where the Sirens lived, and from whose deathly allure Odysseus had to be protected by being tied to a mast with wax blocking his ears from their tempting song. It is undoubtedly no coincidence that our room was named “Li Galli”, because our balcony probably afforded the best view of these islands of any other in the hotel. There was no way I was going to miss the opportunity to do the view justice therefore, and this first sketch of the holiday is my homage to it.

© Nicholas de Lacy-Brown and The Daily Norm, 2001-2014. Unauthorized 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. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to Nicholas de Lacy-Brown and The Daily Norm with appropriate and specific direction to the original content. For more information on the work of Nicholas de Lacy-Brown, head to his art website at www.delacy-brown.com