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Watercolor Snowdrops, and some updates

Published on February 4, 2023April 23, 2023 by RioLeave a comment

Hello out there! Been quite some time since I updated. I wanted to share a video of painting Snowdrops in watercolor but I messed up the recording. I feel so annoyed with myself. LOL. I’m still sharing it here anyway. Just a warning, I did not really manage to show the whole demo. I only got to show the part of drawing, putting the masking fluid, painting the background wash, and the finishing touches. Sorry, about that. I did mention this at the very beginning of the video.

I was thinking it would be so timely to create this watercolor painting of a flower in season! Also, I’ve been going back to botanicals lately. Trying to gain back my courage to trust the artistic journey I really wanted to take in the very beginning before I got into the habit of trying to avoid making my painting look like other people’s paintings, especially when those people seem to copy my style (intentionally or unintentionally). There’s nothing wrong with that. But if it distracts you, you should distance yourself from whatever is dampening or hampering your self-discovery or unique art journey, or you’ll never be able to discover your own style. I was always trying to create something original, and in the course of trying to avoid making my painting look like somebody else’s, I have deviated too much from what I wanted to do in the first place. I was sad about this for a while, but lately, I’m starting to feel enlightened. 🙂

I haven’t uploaded some video in a long time since I’ve been so busy at work, as usual. My second project with the big aeronautics company client started immediately after the first one ended first week of January. But at least, my generous company gave me some time to review for my AWS Solutions Architect Associate certification. Which I passed on the first attempt, I’m so glad! It was not very easy! You need to know all the technologies, networking, cyber security, databases, resource management, devops, etc. It’s also a requirement of my school for my Master’s Degree, in order to get a mention, “Bien”. I’m not really sure if that means “Cum laude”. But I hope so. Haha! Also, I’ve been taking on some bigger roles on the job now. Moving on from plain Full Stack Dev. Yay!

Anyway, I’m happy to announce, I’ll be graduating in a month’s time. Can’t wait to get that shiny new diploma. I’ve always wanted to get a Master’s Degree, and what more, one from a French technical school! I feel kinda proud of myself.

And speaking of announcements, I’m also letting you in on a little secret… I’ll be attending a week-long watercolor retreat here in the beautiful south of France on the last quarter of the year. It’s a week-long, day-to-day watercolor sessions with a famous YT artist. We will also have visits around the lovely town close by where we’re staying, see some museums, do some wine tasting, eat at restaurants, and stay all week at a gorgeous manor with a huge orchard! I can’t wait to meet my favorite YT artist and gain some new friends! I’m so excited about it!

Here’s to bright and cheery times ahead, folks! Thanks for dropping by! 🙂

My Birthday in Paris and Yoyo Ma Concert, etc.

Published on November 27, 2022April 23, 2023 by RioLeave a comment

Last month, I celebrated my birthday in Paris with the hubs and some friends. We stayed at one of our friends’s very lovely apartment, which overlooks the Eiffel Tower. It was wonderful!!! I didn’t wanna leave the room with the view. 😀

We also saw Yoyo Ma at the Philharmonie de Paris. We booked the ticket early this year, and it was almost fully booked! We were still lucky to get seats third row from the stage, facing the front. Here is a video of some of snaps and video shorts I took during the mini-breaks in the concert.

The Philharmonie de Paris was majestic outside, but a bit disappointing inside. But I still had fun watching the concert. It was a birthday gift from my wonderful husband. We had a great time despite the noisy people in the audience violently coughing and sneezing all the time. It was so nerve-wrackingly distracting. I do not know how Yo-Yo Ma managed to keep his calm and cool throughout all the noise. And having said that, I think it will be the last time I will be watching him live. It was too distracting. But it was a real pleasure seeing him live in the flesh. Best birthday gift ever!

Lastly, a bit of update on the job hunt: before going on this trip, exactly a day before, actually, I received a very good news from one of the companies I have applied to. I started working two weeks after this trip. I was ecstatic!!! I have been on the job for two weeks now, and so far, I’m still not disappointed. It’s a great company, one of the biggest French IT Consulting companies, and my client is the biggest aviation company in Europe. Also, I’m working on their big data platform, doing Data Engineering until the end of this year. After that, I might go into another project, of which, I do not know yet. 🙂 I am quite happy. C’est fini, la tristesse.

Cheers, and have a good week ahead!

Fiesta Filipiniana in Le Triadou, France

Published on September 12, 2022April 23, 2023 by RioLeave a comment

My friends and I, together with the Philippine Honorary Consul to Occitanie, Jeffrey Cabuay, went on a trip to Le Triadou, in the South of France to attend a Filipiniana Festival and Art Exhibit. This is a Philippine Festival featuring a programme with Philippine folk dances, and folk songs. There was also an art exhibit, where my artist friends and I contributed some artworks.

The event was organized by the Filipino association, “Tanglaw” (Guiding Light), with members mostly living in Montpellier, France, and around the area.

It was very refreshing to see young people (Filipino students) being very active in the event. There were also some participants and guests from surrounding European countries. It was all very entertaining, relaxing and enjoyable. Even the variety of Filipino food being sold at lunch time were delicious! I had such a great time in this event.

Here are the watercolor artworks I have submitted for the exhibit:

You can get more information about them here:

https://springfugue.com/pahiyas

https://springfugue.com/gumamela

https://springfugue.com/paintings

Also mentioned in my vlog:

https://phinaymarket.com for shopping online Filipino items https://www.zazzle.com/store/springfugue for shopping my online Filipino themed artworks

Thanks for dropping by and have a good day! 🙂

Arch Art Supplies San Francisco Haul Unboxing

Published on July 29, 2022April 23, 2023 by RioLeave a comment

Hey guys! It’s been sooooo long! I had been so so busy with my Master’s degree, especially the last three months! It felt like ages since I last posted here. And it felt like I have aged five years the last three months due to my overly hectic schedule and overwhelming course projects, assignments, exams, etc! But my classes finally ended last June. And although I still have some projects and exams to accomplish, I managed to squeeze in a couple of weeks’ holiday with my family.

We toured the West Coast of the United States, driving from Los Angeles, to Arizona, Utah, Las Vegas and San Francisco. We visited so many, many beautiful places like Venice Beach, The Grand Canyon, Horseshoe Bend and Lower Antelope Canyon in Page, Arizona. We also went to Monument Valley in Utah, Bryce Canyon, Mammoth Lakes, Yosemite Park, Death Valley, and San Francisco. It was super tiring and hot (like hell). I also had to help my husband drive a bit. It was exhausting. But I loved it!!!

That spot in Monument Valley (Border of Utah and Arizona) where the famous scene in Forrest Gump, where he decided to stop running, was shot

Anyway, I managed to drop by an art supplies shop in San Francisco, called, Arch Art Supplies. It had some good reviews on the internet, and it was not so far away from our hotel, Grand Hyatt near Union Square, which I highly recommend! We had such a lovely time there, especially enjoying the complimentary snacks and drinks at the Lounge Club, and the beautiful view of San Francisco from there and in our own room. I especially enjoyed watching “Karl”, the fog roll in and out of the city.

So here is my video, and I hope you enjoy watching it. I’ve included in it some short clips from our trip.

Thanks for dropping by, and have a great weekend! 🙂

Drawing Contest (Concours de dessin) by Art Tea Shop Toulouse

Published on February 18, 2022April 23, 2023 by RioLeave a comment

I was surprised and very flattered to be contacted by Art Tea Shop Toulouse for their Drawing Contest. They asked if they could use the photo I took of my watercolor artwork for their Drawing Contest’s flyers.

J’ai été surprise et très flattée d’être contactée par Art Tea Shop Toulouse pour leur concours de dessin. Ils m’ont demandé s’ils pouvaient utiliser pour les flyers de leur concours de dessin la photo de mon aquarelle que j’ai prise.

If you are interested to join, do visit their instagram page for details.

Si vous êtes interessés, consultez leur instagram pour plus de détails.

This artwork was totally not my best but I guess I captured the mood really well. My composition was not bad at all. And overall, everything in the photo looks quite nice! 🙂

Cette peinture n’est pas du tout ma meilleure, mais je crois que j’ai bien saisi l’ambiance. Ma composition n’était pas mauvaise du tout. Et dans l’ensemble, tout ce qui est sur la photo est très joli 🙂

By the way, they also have a nice restaurant / tea shop, where we had one of our monthly watercolor sessions two years ago.

À propos, ils ont aussi un joli restaurant/salon de thé, où on a fait l’une de nos sessions mensuelles de l’aquarelle l y a deux ans.

If you live around Toulouse, do drop by the Art Tea Shop. It’s a really nice brasserie and tea shop with warm, welcoming staff. The place is very cozy and quite original, they have good food and drinks, and they sell artworks from local artists, too. We totally had a good time there. I should go back one of these days. 🙂

Si vous habitez dans la région de Toulouse, ne manquez pas de vous rendre à l’Art Tea Shop. Il s’agit d’une brasserie et d’un salon de thé très sympathiques avec un personnel chaleureux et accueillant. L’endroit est très confortable et assez original, ils ont de la bonne nourriture et des boissons, et ils vendent des œuvres d’art d’artistes locaux, aussi. On a passé un très bon moment là-bas. Je devrais y retourner un de ces jours. 🙂

Mont Saint-Michel Watercolor Painting Demo

Published on January 30, 2022April 23, 2023 by RioLeave a comment

Hello everyone! How have you been? I hope you’re one of the chosen few who managed to escape the ire of Omicron. It seems to be very much omnipresent and omnipotent these past few months. Only the hashtag blessed (according to some instagram people) have managed to slip through unnoticed.

I, myself, have been under the weather for the last few days now. It’s not COVID, though. Just the common flu. The symptoms might be even worse than Omicron’s, though. I have been feeling like somebody slapped me around the whole night, every morning I wake up. My whole head hurts, especially my eye sockets, my scalp and even my teeth! I got nasty joint pains the first night. I hardly slept. From time to time, I get sharp nasty pains in my ear. Maybe I should redo the auto-test to check if I really don’t have COVID.

Today, I feel much better, though. I now only have a bit of cough and colds, and I sound a bit like Marge Simpson (or a bit like the sexy French Lola voice you usually hear on French TV doing the voice-over on magazine shows (think Edith Piaf!)… only in France! 😀 ) when I talk. That, and despite the fact that I’ve unwittingly wiped out clean my entire local project folder with all my Python Labs Machine Learning codes in it yesterday morning. Who does that?!!! I wanted to slap myself, but my sickness was already making me feel as if I have been slapped around enough already.

What’s good about all these is that I managed to get some free time (no classes also last Thurs and Fri) to paint again. I have been postponing for the longest time to paint Mont-Saint Michel. My family and I had the occasion to visit this magical place up in Normandie during the summer.

I painted it in a loose, quick, relaxing and fun way, as usual. I don’t want to take my paintings too seriously. I just want to have fun doing them. That’s the most important thing to me.

Thanks for dropping by. Cheers, and keep safe, everyone! 🙂

Watercolor Painting of Santorini

Published on November 6, 2021April 23, 2023 by RioLeave a comment

Finally, after almost two years, I managed to travel outside of France once again. My family and I stayed in the lovely island of Santorini in Greece for a week during the school holiday. We stayed in this beautiful apartment in Pyrgos, a quiet area in the middle of the island, away from the bustle of the touristy areas of Oia and Fira.

We had a lovely view of the sea, some of the islands, and the mountains from the balcony of our Airbnb apartment. The view, and the Bougainvillea flowers at the entrance of the apartment inspired me to paint plein air on the balcony, one day, when I had the occasion to take a break from our usual walks.

I had so much fun, and felt so relaxed doing this watercolor painting of a scenery in Santorini. It was actually inspired by this picture of myself standing under the lush and lovely Bougainvillea of our Airbnb apartment. I just edited it a bit to make it look more interesting in the painting.