My perfect brush with Tuscany: Join a painting class at a luxury hotel amid some of Italy's finest rolling countryside Kate Johnson enjoys a lesson with an artist from the Royal Drawing School The writer stayed at the grand Borgo Pignano hotel 30 minutes from Volterra Rooms at the hotel cost from £300 on a bed & breakfast basis READ MORE: Inside 'Versailles in the clouds' - a hotel in Vietnam's mountains By Kate Johnson For The Daily Mail Published: 04:02 EDT, 5 June 2024 | Updated: 04:08 EDT, 5 June 2024 e-mail View comments You could be forgiven for crumbling when handed a paintbrush by an award-winning artist from the Royal Drawing School — while in the gardens of a fine villa overlooking Tuscan hills that inspired some of the world’s greatest artists. Fortunately, Fraser Scarfe is a patient, encouraging tutor. When he takes us on a quick tour of nearly 500 original artworks lining the walls of the grand Borgo Pignano hotel, he’s so self-effacing I have to ask which is his work.
All were created by artists and alumni from the Royal School, founded by the King and artist Catherine Goodman in 2000 to keep life drawing flourishing. A group of postgraduates stay for a few weeks each summer to paint under the eye of a tutor, and maybe leave a work behind. Fraser gives us tips — don’t hold your palette out like a pizza as they do in films, rest it on your forearm, choose a small area of the canvas to focus on, draw big and bold outlines in pencil — and sets us up wi.