This year, the beginning of June started out in such a lovely and memorable way - that is with an especially happy painting weekend in Gozo with my troupe of art students. The group was made up of 6 of us and began on Saturday morning running through to Sunday evening. Though getting to Gozo was not as straight forward as expected (as unfortunately 2 of the group members just missed getting onto the same 9am boat with the rest of us) in the end we all met up at my house in Zebbug and were soon painting in earnest.
Of course the fact that we all 'clicked' so well and shared so many lessons over the previous months also helped the group to bond more easily. After wondering through the house for a while, the group soon settled down in their selected spot and quickly began painting. Light music from the CD player floated from inside the house and our enthusiasm and fun of it all grew as the two days progressed. Indeed the whole group was soon planning to have the next painting holiday as soon as possible. (September perhaps??)
Still life and quaint angles were the subject of our 2 day trip - but besides this we also did manage to eat and drink well, chat, laugh and tease too.
So when our lunch break arrived at one pm it was well organised and anticipated - pitching in together was easy and preparing food and drink and laying out all the goodies went like clockwork. After all we came prepared with such a variety of fresh veg and fruit and wine.
When evening came we went out to see a concise but masterly art exhibition by Debbie Caruana Dingli in Rabat and then went off to eat some seafood at Marsalforn - on returning to the house we were up till after one in the morning playing cards and joking - so for most of us sleeping came easily when we finally dragged ourselves reluctantly off to bed ... Next morning saw us painting early and enjoying the day so much that those who had planned to leave earlier couldn't resist cancelling plans at home and staying on late into the afternoon with the rest of the group.
A lovely surprise came in the end to commemorate the weekend - my beloved students secretly prepared a little painting of their favourite corner all on the same watercolour sheet and left my space (top centre) free for me to put in my own little painting - The plan is now for this wonderful memento to find a home in my house so that every time I look at it I can smile and remember one of my happiest weekends at Ta Xmun Farmhouse.
