Hope by Sara Calcagno

“Hope” un piccolo dipinto

di Arte Contemporanea


Se è vero che un pittore parla con i propri dipinti, il mio ultimo piccolissimo dipinto “HOPE” (dimensioni 19 x 20 cm) sicuramente è una delle opere che meglio esprime le mie sensazioni e i miei sentimenti di questi tempi. Periodo non facile questo, di incertezza geopolitica, economica, sanitaria, climatica.. eppure noi esseri umani esistiamo perchè pieni di speranza.

“Hope”, la Speranza, è un piccolo bambino che scruta intensamente dinnanzi a sè quasi abbagliato eppure pieno di vita e di potenzialità. Ho appena finito questo dipinto e, al momento, ne sono innamorata! Vi piace?

Hope fa parte della mia serie “Regine di Fiori”.

HOPE, dipinto olio su tela di Sara Calcagno, 19 cm x 20 cm

www.saracalcagno.it

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Il mio ritratto dal vero con modella per Albino In Arte 2021

di Pittura dal vero con modellaRitratto dal vero


Domenica scorsa le strade del centro storico di Albino (Bg) si sono vestite d’Arte per Albino in Arte, una delle iniziative volte a festeggiare il cinquecentenario della nascita del grande artista albinese Gian Battista Moroni.

Eravamo in 80 artisti tra pittori e scultori più alcuni musicisti e una cantastorie. Tutti artisti selezionati da un comitato artistico. Io ero presente con l’esposizione mie opere e, dal mattino alla sera, ho dipinto un ritratto dal vero della mia modella e amica Anna Laura.

Mi sono divertita molto a dipingere dal vero Anna Laura e l’accoglienza della gente è stata calorosa: sono state davvero tante le persone che si sono fermate a chiacchierare, chiedendomi informazioni sui dipinti, un biglietto da visita o anche solo per farmi i complimenti. E’ stato bello, soprattutto se si pensa da dove arriviamo quest’anno: ovvero un anno e mezzo di lockdown e relazioni umane assenti causate dal maledetto Covid!! Dunque è stato emozionante ritrovarmi ad incontrare le persone dal vero, parlare con sconosciuti (chi si ricordava più cosa voleva dire..) e vedere le strade del centro storico di questa bella cittadina pieno di persone con la voglia di vedere e vivere l’arte. E poi mi sono ritrovata a pensare, già per la seconda volta in pochi giorni, che mi piace davvero tanto la pittura dal vero, è entusiasmante!

Purtroppo, essendo molto impegnata a dipingere, non mi sono concessa il lusso di farmi una passeggiata per conoscere gli altri artisti. Questo mi spiace.. Ma d’altronde, è anche vero che, se l’avessi fatto, non sarei mai riuscita a finire il ritratto in giornata e non avrei fatto il mio show .. e dunque: benissimo così!! Gli organizzatori sono stati talmente bravi da chiamare ben tre fotografi a ritrarre Albino in Arte, ciascuno con la propria lettura. E con i loro meravigliosi scatti mi hanno dato un’idea più che completa dello spettacolo che è stato Albino quel giorno: una meraviglia!! Sono orgogliosa di averne fatto parte.

L’iniziativa è stata organizzata dalle associazioni del territorio Arte sul Serio e Circolo Fotografico Città del Moroni – Albino. Grazie ragazzi, siete stati bravissimi!! :))

 

Sara Calcagno - Still life

An autumn painting with pumpkins and sunflowers

di Arte ContemporaneaStill lifeStudies


Still life with pumpkin and sunflowers. Oil painting by Sara Calcagno, 30 x 40 cm. Last autumn I painted this still life study with pumpking and sunflowers in one session.. only in a second moment, I refined the painting.

I love autumn color and autumn fruits and vegetables. I love autumn. I think maybe is my favorite season together with late spring.. Anyway, if you think about it, both autumn and late spring are magical moments for nature! Lots of different seasonal fruits and flowers are at their best  and very mature and so rich in their colors. The painting has already found a collector.

Sara Calcagno - Still life

Peonies’ Dream, the idealized memory of peonies

di Arte ContemporaneaFlowersStill lifeStudiesWorks


With this painting I tried to paint the idealized memory of a peony garden: the dream of a peony garden. It is a study and it isn’t so big but neither so small.. I enjoyed with experimenting on this piece.. I finished it some days ago.

Peonies are such a poetic flower, with all those gigantic light petals. They amaze with their size and with their splendour. I adore going in peony gardens and absorbing their energy and their beauty. They are such beautiful and poetic flowers! For some years, in the past, I lived in Montefiascone (Viterbo, Italy) and in april and may I used to go very often to Centro Botanico Moutan in Vitorchiano. There they grow all kinds of peonies, they say they have the biggest collection of chines peonies in Europe! I don’t know, if it’s the biggest. For sure it is astonishing. They have such a gorgeous collection .. you can litterally walk among peonies high like yourself for hours.. This year I would have loved to go again but due to covid lockdown, we couldn’t move from our region. Pity but it will be for next year! I was lucky that my neighbor has the most amazing peonies and I could make so many pics.

Hope you will enjoy this study. It was funny to paint it and the result is what I expected, a little bit dreamy and ethereal.

Peonies’ Dream, oil on canvas by Sara Calcagno, 41 x 22 cm

 

 

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The New Romantics, the need for infinity

di Arte ContemporaneaLandscapesMountains


I love the mountains.  I adore that sensation you feel, when you’re arrived at your goal and the stunning landscape all around you repays you for all your effort. What makes us overcome our limits? What makes us going always a little further and wanting to discover always new places?  What is that need of adventure, that need of strong emotions and strong feelings always pushing us towards the unknown? This painting represent some of us ..those, for those is true the quote by Robert Frost “Two roads diverged in a wood  and I, I took the one less traveled by. And that made all the difference”.

In this painting I wanted only two main character and one subject. The first character is for sure the amazing location in all its triumphant beauty (the Italian Alps in Aosta Valley, Italy). The second character is my model, representing all of us with the same spirit.. And here we are at the subject: the need for infinity, for new discoveries, the adventurer in the sense intended in the XIX century, the one I feel so near my soul.

About the amazing alpine landscape seen from the top of the mountains, of course is an homage to Caspar David Friedrich famous one, the Wanderer above the Sea of Fog, dating 1818. The figure represents for sure the artist, and all people like me in need for infinity with the particular adventurous spirit, with a romantic approach to life.

I am totally in love with the alpine landscapes and with the Aosta Valley, that I live since I was a child and where I have dear friends and dear memories.

The New Romantics, Painting by Sara Calcagno, oil on canvas, 76 x 35 cm

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Dreamers

“The Dreamers”

di Arte ContemporaneaWorks


The Dreamers is the first painting of a new series I’m working on in these months.

Two lovers are just resting after love. They enjoy the sun, they enjoy nature, they enjoy life.

This painting is a celebration of life,  of love and of beauty.

The Dreamers is a painting oil on canvas, 27,5 x 39,4 inches ( 70 x 100 cm).

The Dreamers is available for sale. For more information do not hesitate to contact me via PM  to my WhatsApp no. +393489136889 or to my email address sara.calcagno@gmail.com.

dav

Portrait study after Sargent

di PortraitsStudies


Who doesn’t know the gorgeous portraits by John Singer Sargent?

He was a famous American painter, born in Massachusetts in 1820 and died in London in 1925. He is generally considered one if the most famous portrait painters of XIX Century.

His beautiful portraits speak for themselves. I’ve studied his painting technique and  many of his portraits.

Among them there is this portrait of a woman with glasses. Her severe but ironic face is so interesting my interest was literally completely captured and I decided to copy it.

I made a painting using the wet on wet method, that is I painted it in one day and tried to maintain the fresh look of the original.

Hope you like it!

Portrait of Cassandra by Sara Calcagno

Portrait of Cassandra

di Portraits


I painted this portrait in 2017, after a painting workshop in Tuscany, that I organized with the wonderful American painter Michelle Dunaway

We were in Val d’Orcia, exactly in the property in which some of the most beautiful scenes of the movie “The Gladiator” were filmed. Do you remember the movie the Gladiator by Ridley Scott and starred by Russel Crowe?

We were in the Elysian fields of  the movie,  walking through the same secular alley of Cypressus trees and looking at the same fields where Maximus’ wife and son waited for him.

Cassandra, a splendid local girl that was modeling for us that day, playing the role of the Mediterranean and beautiful wife of Maximus Decimus Meridius.

An unforgettable demo by Michelle

I will never forget the morning of Michelle’s demo, and the atmosphere of the moment. The location was gorgeous, we were outside in the fields down under the alley of secular cypressus trees. Everything was simply astonishing and magic. The location was stunning, Michelle’s demo was great, the soundtrack of the movie was on, the dramatic light and the sky were fantastic, with the clouds moving fast in the sky and making the scene appear gorgeous as if we were on a stage with a gigantic bull’s eye lighning up now this hill now that one.

All this while Cassandra was standing proud and fierce looking faraway at the horizon, playing the rule better than a movie star.

That morning everything was breathtaking, wonderful and exciting and we were all very much inspired by the location, by the weather  and by Cassandra. We made so many photoshoots and videos!!

Portrait after photos

One of these many photos became afterwards this particular portrait.

Normally I like very much to paint portraits by photos but only if I took personally the photos and if I spent some time with the model of the portrait. This is because, if I took personally the photos, when I make the portrait from those photos, I can feel the same emotions and vibrations I felt while shooting them. Emotions and vibrations are essential in painting.

Of course we cannot paint well if we don’t communicate emotions and we cannot communicate emotions if we don’t feel them ourselves..

Thank you

Thanks to Cassandra for beeing such an inspiring model. Since that day I asked Cassi to model for me many times and in many different occasions and she will be also present in the paintings I’m preparing right in this period.

And thanks to my dear friend and gorgeous artist Michelle Dunaway for being such a wonderful, inspiring and poetic painter always looking for beauty.

That was really an unforgettable  workshop..

If you are interested in one of my paintings or you wish to receive more information about commissioning me a portrait, don’t hesitate to contact me by email or phone. Email: sara.calcagno@gmail.com Phone/WhatsApp  ph. no. +39 348 9136889

After Rembrandt - Portrait of an Old Man - Sara Calcagno

Some thoughs about studying the Masters

di PortraitsStudies


Like most of us, I love Rembrandt  and his paintings..

In particular, I find his portraits particularly beautiful and intense and I totally love his technique! I like the thickness of his painting and the apparent  roughness of his style in some points.

Rembrandt was certainly very modern for his times and I find his style sometimes really surprising and strong.

after rembrandt - old woman reading - sara calcagno
After Rembrandt – Old woman reading – Sara Calcagno

Because of my love for Rembrandt, a couple of years ago I decided to spend some time in making copies after some of his portraits. I decided to go small (all these paintings are no more than  11 x 8 inches big)  and I gave myself only one day for each one of these portraits.

It was a real challenge but I had also a lot of fun

For a little painting like these ones, for studying the image and drawing it I spent at least  three/four hours. Of course, if the painting was bigger I would have needed much more time!

I stand there looking at the image and drawing it until I was sure I liked the drawing and I perfectly understood the forms and the points on which I wanted to focus my attention both in the drawing and in the painting.

For me, these two steps are the most important ones, the ones in which I get in connection with the masterpiece. If I don’t analyze with attention the subject or if I go too fast with the drawing, this normally means to me making a bad painting or one without a soul. Painting needs time and concentration.

After Rembrandt - Portrait of an old man - Sara Calcagno
After Rembrandt – Portrait of an old man – Sara Calcagno

For coloring with oils little studies like these ones, I needed around another three/four hours. It was not so much time but again.. it was so only because these were very small paintings. If they were bigger, I would have certainly needed more time.

I find particularly helpful making copies after paintings I love. It helps me learning and making steps forward in my technique. I always say, that making copies after great Masters  is like making a private lesson with a great painter. It is like getting intimate with him/ her. Sometimes you can even figure out what the Master had in mind when he made some technical choices and when this happens, it is gorgeous and exciting.

This little painting I did after Rembrandt is (like most of the little studies I made) a detail of a bigger painting. I wasn’t interested in making the copy of the whole painting. I only wished to focus on the portrait and, in particular, I wished to focus on the portrait of an old man as I really love as Rembrand painted old people. I think he could really capture old people’s soul.. These faces really speak to me and have some real magic.

Hope you like this copy of an old man after Rembrandt and, if you are a painter, I wish you happy inspiration and happy painting!

If you wish to receive more information about my paintings or you are interested in commissioning me a portrait, don’t hesitate to write me through WhatsApp or call me directly at the number +39 348 9136889 

dav

A color study of autumn colors

di Studies


Last sunday I made this little colored painting with the technique wet on wet (or “alla prima”).

The subject is a basket full of red and yellow apples. It is taken after a photo I made a couple of years ago, exactly in an autumn day like these ones.

Autumn inspires me always very much. Autumn colors, autumn lights, autumn fruits and flowers. For this reason it happens often I make some still lifes in this period of the year.

This was a very small and quick one. Some kind of simple “color study”, as I didn’t want to spend too much time on it, I gave myself only one day so I decided to concentrate particularly on colors. My main goal was to paint the warm autumn colors and autumn lights.

I enjoyed very much painting this subject and I could enjoy more only by painting the same subject from life..

Next time for sure!

 

Copy after Todorovitsch - by Sara Calcagno

Studying Todorovich

di Studies


Dear friends, just a little study after a painting by Joseph Todorovich representing a red-haired young girl outdoor in plein sun and with closed eyes. I love this portrait, I find it poetic and full of magic. If you wish to commission me a portrait, I would love to paint an impressionistic painting.. I love the feeling of freshness and colors of impressionistic portraits.