Oil and water do mix

Carole Boller takes women out to sea to teach them to paint, using the Orange County coastal landscape and lavish treatment as inspiration. Why buy a pretty postcard when you can paint your own?

Whether Newport Beach is home or just a vacation spot, there’s a new way to experience the city’s seaside landscape -- and learn a little something while you’re at it.

Local plein-air painter Carole Boller is offering a unique opportunity for women to learn to paint, with Newport’s coastal landscape as the inspiration.

Boller takes groups of up to six women on a painting adventure aboard one of several boats. The excursions can be a tour of Newport Harbor on a Duffy boat or a day-long journey to Catalina Island.

“It’s for ... a person that always wanted to paint,” Boller said.

The boat is anchored for several hours while Boller teaches the women to paint with oils on linen canvases. The seascape provides the ideal scene for a novice painter; landscapes are the easiest to paint for beginners, Boller said.

“The water and the sky usually reflect each other -- that usually makes a very simple painting,” Boller said.

But the experience is much more than an art lesson -- it’s an elegant and pampered outing.

The painting is intermingled with snacking on a lavish spread of catered delights and sipping on fine wine.

“I take care off all their stuff, they don’t even have to lift a finger,” Boller said.

At the end of the day, the new artists get to take home an oil painting they created themselves.

“It’s not so much the product you’re painting but the process,” Boller said.

Boller, a Midwest transplant, has operated a studio in Newport Beach for several years. She has always been a painter and a teacher; she’s also a docent at the Irvine Museum.

Boller created the art trip specifically for women; it’s nothing against men, but sometimes women just need a place where they can bond.

“There are some times when I just want to be with my girlfriends,” Boller said.

She came up with the idea after hearing comments from women who visited her Balboa Peninsula studio and said they wanted to learn to paint. Since she started the program four months ago, it’s been very successful, Boller said.

Visitors coming to Newport Beach are always looking for activities to do in and around the water, said Jessica Roswell, marketing and public relations manager for the Newport Beach Conference and Visitors Bureau.

Anything to do with being out on the water and around boats is very popular, Roswell said.

For more information, go to www.bollerart.com.20060210iug1s0ncDOUGLAS ZIMMERMAN / DAILY PILOT(LA)Carole Boller teaches women to paint, and provides a pampered outing complete with food and fine wine, while at sea.