Becky's photoblog

A few glimpses of the snow-covered greenhouse, and the courtyard at the Gardner’s Third Thursday

Started a lovely Saturday by attending a lecture at the Gardner Museum about an ancient epic tale, then snapping this lovely shot of the Gardner’s much-need mid-winter oasis of greenery, because I can! I do love me some ancient epic tales …

The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum recently changed its photography policy to allow visitors to take photos of the courtyard (photography is still prohibited in the rest of the museum). This means that after ten years of volunteering and ten years of enjoying this incredibly unique and magnificent space, I can finally take pictures of it!

We have been out to Worcester several times in the last year or so, and yet we haven’t been to the Worcester Art Museum in a long time (since we first got together). What else is there to do but go to a museum on a rainy three-day weekend when football isn’t on til later in the afternoon?

A glimpse of lovely purple flowers at the Gardner Museum’s greenhouse before heading out in to the cold after a fun evening of volunteering!

Anyone who has been to my house in the last few years has perhaps noticed one of my paintings, which was hanging in our living room as if it was a finished painting (I don’t have enough storage space for my paintings, so works in progress are often ‘stored’ on our walls). That painting wasn’t actually finished until today.

Bates Hall at the Boston Public Library – by Becky DiMattia
oil on 12×20″ canvas
2014

Bates Hall is the majestic main study room in the Boston Public Library in Copley Square (click here for the BPL’s page about this room). On one of our many field trips around Boston, I took Brian to the Boston Public Library when I realized that he had never explored the library’s many art and architectural treasures. (photoblog post from that day in ’08 when we had only been together about 4 months).

It was an eye-opening experience for Brian because it was his first real glimpse of his father as a teenager, starting his lifetime career in the library industry with his first job shelving books in the spectacular halls of learning at the Boston Public Library. This past summer, Brian recalled that first visit to Bates Hall in his father’s eulogy.

I started this painting in Summer 2012, after getting a good photo of Bates Hall during my wanderings on a gorgeous day off (photoblog post from that day). Yes, it somehow took me two and a half years to complete this rather small painting. I guess I got distracted.

Also, this was probably one of the most challenging paintings I’ve ever done … partly because of the tricky perspective, partly because of so many little details, partly because it had become so important to us, but mostly because I tried two very stupid experiments with this painting. I thought it might be ‘fun’ to challenge two basic steps in starting a painting, and I now know better.

First, I didn’t sand the canvas. I usually use a very fine sandpaper to sand the gesso primer, and that gives you a nice smooth surface to paint on. I thought it might be interesting to paint on a rough texture, but it just made it hard for the paint to cover the surface. Basically, it felt like my paintbrushes weren’t working right the whole time.

And second, I didn’t start with a ground color. I usually start every painting by covering the entire surface in a basic color like yellow ochre (mixed with white) or cerulean blue (mixed with white). I thought it might be interesting to start with white, and then just simply not paint the windows. This did actually work well for the windows, but it made the rest of the painting really hard to paint. This, combined with not sanding the canvas, meant that it was just plain hard to paint in all of the details, and cover over every trace of the white canvas surface. For the longest time, I felt like I was getting nowhere with this.

But then I look back at the photos I took along the way, and I remember that this one really did come a long way! Brian worked hard on this too, providing incredibly valuable observations, suggestions, and coffee. It’s quite amazing how many of my paintings are starting to feel like our paintings.

In mid-November, the Harvard Art Museums reopened after several years of renovations. Harvard has spectacular collections and a gorgeous museum, so I’ve been looking forward to this reopening for many years. I’ve been a little distracted since mid-November, but we finally got over there this afternoon and it was fanastic!

It’s winter break and I’ve been painting up a storm … stayed tuned!

The Old South Ringers is Old South Church’s handbell choir, and the put on an amazing Christmas concert. It’s incredibly beautiful (the music and the setting), and this has become one of my favorite holiday traditions.

I’m going to be doing a painting of a bride on her wedding day, and her big day finally arrived! I had a wonderful afternoon walking through the North End to Battery Wharf, which happens to be one of my favorite places in Boston (and not just because it has a wonderful view across the harbor to the Hyatt where we were married). The bridal suite at the Fairmont Battery Wharf is literally right at the end of the wharf, and it has some really incredible views. I had the honor of hanging out with the wedding party during some of the formal photos, as well as with my friend, the mother of the bride. We took some really wonderful photos for the painting, and I can’t wait to get started!

After we were done with the photos, I walked back through the North End to head home for a quick change before heading back out again to see Fitz and the Tantrums at the House of Blues! Great show.

While we were near Dulles for a lovely family occasion, we spent the afternoon at the Udvar-Hazy Center, a companion facility to the National Air & Space Museum. I’ve never been to the actual Air & Space Museum in DC, but this place is absolutely enormous, with a gajillion vehicles that have actually traveled in air and in space and it was absolutely spectacular.

Three highlights: seeing the actual Enola Gay, seeing the actual Discovery Shuttle, and seeing the look on my husband’s face when he saw the SR-71 Blackbird.

We wandered through the Boston Arts Festival in Columbus Park (a favorite open-air art market, which we he hadn’t checked out in a few years) before heading back to the car and heading up to New Hampshire for the evening. A little dose of inspiration in the middle of a lovely day!

I volunteered at the Gardner Museum for the third of three Neighborhood Nights … a summer tradition of fun, games, art and music at the Gardner on lovely summer evenings, all for free. I’ve been volunteering at this event for many many years.

Second date-night in a row this week! Delicious dinner in Mission Hill with Deanna, then a lovely walk past the gorgeous Mission Church to her car.

The Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, CA

On our last day in LA, we headed out to Pasadena so I could show Brian the Norton Simon Museum. We had also heard that the Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens was lovely, and it was open earlier, so we headed there first.

This place is absolutely gorgeous! Henry and Arabella Huntington amassed an enormous collection of rare books, art, and plants from all over the world, and it was an incredibly pleasant and peaceful place to wander around. In the library, we saw a Gutenberg Bible (among many other fascinating things). In the art collection, we saw the usual array of lovely paintings and interesting sculptures, and the gardens truly knocked our socks off. The rose garden was spectacular, and the Japanese garden, with the lily pads, the bridge and the colorful fish swimming in the pond was really breath-taking!

After the Getty Center, we headed down to see the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. We mixed up the timing, so we only had an hour, but that gave us enough time to breeze through a lovely exhibit on Calder, a Japanese collection of Chinese paintings, and an exhibit of weird modern art, plus one whole floor of the permanent collection … a bit rushed, but a really great hour!!

After wandering around LA in the morning, we headed up to the Getty Center. This was the first of the five museums that we visited in our three days in Los Angeles. As with almost of the museums in the area, it’s an amazing place to enjoy the outside spaces, then head inside to check out some galleries, then pop back outside to admire the view, then head back inside for more art, and so on. We had both been to the Getty before, but never together. The Getty has a handful of my favorites, and it’s like visiting old friends! We could have stayed all afternoon, but we were also eager to head to LACMA.

Cathedral Basilica of St. Joseph in downtown San Jose, CA

Every year on Mother’s Day weekend, Harvard’s Ceramics Program hosts a spring sale, and we’ve gone to see it a few times before. This year, they were in a beautiful new light-filled space, and we saw some really gorgeous pieces.

I gave a tour of the Gardner Museum to Courtney and a few of her friends who were in town for the weekend – I love meeting my friends’ friends because they are always, without fail, awesome people!

And, we got to see this year’s hanging nasturtiums in the courtyard … and they are truly gorgeous this year!

I have visited just about all of the gorgeous churches in Back Bay, taken a lot of pictures, and added them to my ongoing project, Architectural Landmarks of Boston’s Back Bay. When my cousin recently mentioned his upcoming visit to Arlington Street Church for a friend’s ordination, it reminded me that I haven’t been to see ASC’s gorgeous Tiffany windows in a very long time. And the last time I was there, I didn’t have my camera!

Most churches are open during the day for prayers and tourists, so it’s easy to wander in off the street, drop your jaw over the gorgeous architecture and windows, snap a few great photos to savor the details, and enjoy a peaceful moment of reflection. ASC seems to operate on a weird schedule, and I have the door to be locked the last few times I tried. Not this time.

Arlington Street Church is a Unitarian Universalist Church at the corner of Arlington and Boylston Streets, at the edge of Boston’s Back Bay, right across from the Public Gardens. It was opened in 1861, and it was the first public building in Back Bay. Its spire is 190 feet tall, complete with a bell, weathervane and clocks. The church has an incredibly gorgeous collection of Tiffany stained glass windows, and their collection is among the largest and finest collections of Louis Comfort Tiffany’s work.