San Marino is on of three countries that is completely surrounded by another country, that is Italy. The other surrounded countries the Holy See (Vatican City) also surrounded by Italy, and Lesotho completely surrounded by South Africa. A few blogs back I was musing about how mountainous countries seem to be less conquered in history, but the story on San Marino is a little different. Although mountainous in places, there were no particular defense attributes this country had, rather, it was the complicated history of Italy. Before I started the series, I did not know that Italy only formed as a country more recently, during the mid 19th century actually. Prior to that it was a collection of regional areas, the remnants of the Roman Empire. San Marino has been independent since antiquity, although is suffered from some occupations by Italy and France. In the World Wars they stayed neutral. Their government is unique, they rule by an elected committee rather than a head of state, and there are elections every 6 months.
Exploring pictures of San Marino revealed a lot of chartreuse (lime green) and yellow-tan colours, with dark pine trees. In the Italy painting, there was a similar colour scheme, and olive trees were shown. In this painting of San Marino I started by painting an elaborate field of grass with flowers, then realized it was the foliage of an imaginary tree so I flipped the painting over and painted the tree trunk, branches and added a simple wash for the grassy meadow. Just missing the Spring Fawn!
World Inspired Landscapes: San Marino, watercolour 8 x 10" cold press, March 2025
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