Stroke of Genius

Painting holidays are not all early nights and cups of tea, as journalist and budding amateur artist Rebecca Rose discovers on a trip to Tuscany

When I was 15, a friend and I took a coach down to the Dordogne in France. We had a glorious week – painting outside in the sunshine all day long and pickling ourselves on rum and coke all night.

It was my first painting holiday and it was spectacular. OK, the fact that we were underage drinkers and studying for exams definitely attracted unwanted attention from the other – rather more elderly – painting enthusiasts on the tour, but we didn’t mind. When I say elderly, one woman must only have been 30, and was accompanying her mother, but that was double our age, for goodness sake! As far as we were concerned, they were all ancient, and we were far more interested in two teenage boys who were holidaying nearby.

The fruits of that trip – a series of bold, experimental watercolours of French village scenes – still adorn my parents’ kitchen walls, and make me nostalgic for that carefree, creative summer. I’ve been attempting to find an artists’ holiday that would live up to that one ever since – fast-paced London living just doesn’t allow time for painting.

I’ve now hit 30 myself, and set my sights on a trip not just filled with people my parents’ age. Don’t get me wrong, I like the spirited independent older traveller very much, and in many ways a great deal more than the smug, 30-something, wi-fi, novel-writing backpacker. Yet a cosy week with other people’s grandparents was not what I needed. This was to be my return to artistic grandeur, after all.

After searching hundreds of websites offering painting holidays, I scrutinised the photographs of previous guests and found most were a superannuated, albeit jolly, lot. My own mother confirmed my suspicions on her subsequent return from a painting holiday, again in south-west France, where the country lanes are dotted with British lady water colourists like so many daisies in a field.

“It was so much fun!” she told me.

“Everyone was my age, and they were all women, apart from one poor man. We had so much in common.”

This was not promising.

I telephoned some of the art holiday companies direct. “Well, they range from mid- 50s to… well, we have one guest who is 96!” said one. So far, so bad.

Then I spoke to Kathryn Wernham of Studio Paradiso, a painting holiday company based in County Donegal in Ireland and northern Tuscany, after seeing a photo of her and boyfriend Dermot on their website. They looked young and energetic, while the website was suitably serious for the aspirant painter.

Kathryn was as enthusiastic and down to earth as I had hoped. She explained that the week I wanted to visit there was a mixed age group expected and, being 30 herself, together with Dermot they set a fun, youthful tone to the week. Crucially, she reassured me that the tutor, Ivan Minto, would be able to teach all abilities. This was good news, as I was again impatient to dive in head first, rather than start with colour charts and perspective lessons.

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