Sunset at tea house
This is a painting inspired when I visited the Marble House this winter. The Marble house is a "cottage" in Newport, Rhode Island. In reality, its actually an incredibly large mansion, on Bellevue Avenue, and this tea house is in its backyard. This tea house was built by Alva Vanderbilt, who hosted tea parties for women's suffrage, or the right to vote. Newport has quite a history of wealthy families, their homes, and rich heiresses that made matches with Englishmen with titles. A lot of English families lived on their large estates and needed a surge of wealth to maintain their homes and staff depending on them. A match with these wealthy heiresses filled the coffers and saved them from ruin, but sadly most matches were of convenience and not love. If you are local to New England, it is definitely worth a trip to see these "cottages" and the beautiful Ocean Drive area. If I sound like an add for Newport's tourism, its because I have been going there for years and love to visit!
This was the tea house one late afternoon, touched by a pinkish, orange sunset. I started this painting with a palette knife, but gave up and finished it with brushes. I did keep some of the palette knife strokes, but its mostly brush strokes. I hope to try the palette knife again sometime, as I do enjoy a challenge!
Painting is 10" tall by 20" wide, unframed, about 1" thick, and has a light varnish over painting.