Poster from Volterra's local historical museum advertising Wladek Fuch's art exhibit.

Associate Professor Wladek Fuchs knows how to mix work and pleasure; his recent summer stint in Volterra, Italy is proof. For UDM architecture students, Volterra, an Etruscan hill town in Tuscany, is known as the home of a 25-year old foreign summer study program. Despite its diminutive size, Volterra is a historical treasure trove of archaeology, fine arts, and of course—fine dining.

Because the town is so small, students can easily interact with residents and learn the town's economic and social conditions first hand. Such relevance aids in the creation of their work; typically, their final project reflects the city's own architectural issues. Fuchs went to Volterra as a faculty member several times, most recently in 2002 and in 2008, and quickly fell under its spell.

"My free time, outside of teaching, was spent painting and drawing Volterra's sights," he says. The watercolors, delicate washes of sepias, ochres and blues, depict the town's architecture and landscapes. Detailed black and white renderings of local sights offer an intuitive, almost photogenic view of Volterra. Local residents took notice of his work and invited Fuchs to display 23 drawings and paintings in the local Pinacoteca (historical art museum).

In addition to the drawings and paintings, Fuchs also produced an animated film depicting a three-dimensional reconstruction of the local Roman theater. Dating from the first century BC, the theater now stands in ruins just outside the city walls. This film was also shown continuously during the local exhibit. Following Fuchs' show, the local historical museum asked to include the movie in its permanent collection.

Conveniently, the nine-day display, called "Pietre Silenziose," or silent stones, coincided with UDM's summer program.

Wladek Fuch's paintings were displayed on the museum's stone walls.

"I dedicated this exhibit to the citizens and town of Volterra. Here, I wanted to show how I felt about the town," Fuchs says. "It was an unusual exhibit in that I was presenting something about the town to its inhabitants, rather than showing them something from the outside." While Fuchs was delighted to share his work with the town, the residents were clearly pleased with what they saw. In the museum's guest book, a citizen wrote, "The city is seen by an outsider, but with the heart of a Volterran."

Watercolors were the medium of choice for his Volterra paintings because he worked in open air. "Watercolor is the perfect outdoor painting technique. It is like nature: gentle and beautiful, but also unpredictable and capricious," he says. "You will only learn to work with it if you allow it to paint itself."  Of his more technical drawings, Fuchs says. "Drawing is the essence of visual arts. Whether it is a quick sketch or a more elaborate design, it is the first, natural reaction to the artistic inspiration. In the end, nothing will ever compare to the power and beauty of a single, subtle line on the pure surface of the sketching paper."

Throughout the exhibit, Fuchs' affection for his adopted town is evident, and the residents seem to have returned the favor. "I now get a resident discount at the local wine shop," he says. "I'm not a tourist any more."

Please see more of Wladek Fuch's artwork at art.archgrafx.com.