Mel's Painting 200 Blog

The Atmospheric Landscape project is definitely one of my favorite projects I've done in my painting career, I just love how all 3 paintings turned out. The first painting I worked on was the dip-tic at the bottom, I hadn't painted a one yet and I really wanted to see how it would turn out using the Santa Monica Pier as the main composition. It was also my first time painting a water or ocean scene, so I really wanted to challenge myself. The dip tic was made with black and white oil paint. The second painting I worked on for this project was the 2nd photo and my second attempt at drawing the Santa Monica Pier. I used only black oil paint and paint thinner, no white paint was used. The second painting is my favorite of this series, it just has so many delicate details, especially in the water. My final painting was the lighthouse. It was made using acrylic paint. I wasn't sure if I should put a light in the lighthouse or use a light beam, since that seems almost ...

The Reduction project was especially difficult to due, since it meant to abstract a painting that either we had to make earlier or from a masterpiece. My first reduction showed my struggle with this project since I didn't change it enough from the original, except for adding color, since the original was a monotone brown. Using reduction in my work didn't really connect until I started doing the second reduction, where I wanted the composition to be more geometric and have more color, or better use of color. I wanted to use more variety in marks and make the overall composition sharper, especially since the original painting and first reduction were so organic in shape. I really enjoy how the second reduction painting turned out overall.