Venice - Friday 13th May 2005 (morning)

Guess who didn't realise it was Friday the 13th?

The rest of the party class went off to paint further up into Cannareggio but since that was where we stayed last time we came to Venice, I decided to stick around the Rialto area which I'd not got around to looking at properly last time.

So I loaded up the trolley and set off in the traghetto at San Sofia for the fish market just the other side of the Grand Canal where we painted on the first day.

Last Friday it was in full swing as a fish market. Now to avoid loading this thread with yet more images I'm going to post a link to images of and explanations about the Fish Market and Fruit and Vegetable Markets which is rather good. This is the day I took well over a 100 photos of fish and fruit and veg and the market. Here's a just a very small selection of the fish I saw in the market.

The fruit and veg market was just as good - and I finally got the hang of that thing with digi cameras where you use the screen thingie to show you what you're doing - and as a result you can take all sorts of photos which you can't do if you've got your eye smack up against it in normal photo taking mode - it was a very educational experience!

Here are a few of the fruit and veg piccies. Notice how the green and white asparagus are decorated with wisteria blooms - colour co-ordinated or what? And have you ever seen dried tomatoes like this before - I certainly haven't?

I finally dragged myself away from the market and set off to find a place to paint.

I'd had a notion of doing the Rialto Bridge but as a background. Here's the drawing I did which when worked up will be called 'The steps near the Rialto Bridge' slight pun fully intended.

This is very much a colour sketch rather than a WIP and probably won't be finished. It's the only piece I did while I was there in which I consciously tried to work people in while I was working - and very difficult it was too as the models kept moving. Fortunately I had a couple - whose photo I won't post - who stayed very still for a long time and were sitting in a wonderful place in compositional terms. All the 'real life' people will lose their identities in the painting so it becomes one of those paintings were people will think "that could have been me".

Lunch comes next!

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