How the Impressionists Used Complementary Colors to Great Effect

Complementary colors are basically colors that are on directly opposite sides of the color wheel. So blue is a complement of orange, red is a complement of green, yellow is a complement of violet and so on. Complementary colors provide striking visual effects when paired together. Claude Monet said this about complementary colors in 1888: … Read more

How to Use Atmospheric Perspective to Create Depth in Your Paintings

What is atmospheric perspective? Atmospheric perspective (or aerial perspective) refers to how the atmosphere affects how we see objects as they recede into the distance. Atmospheric perspective indicates that as an object recedes into the distance relative to the viewer, we see that object with reduced clarity, value and color saturation. In addition, objects in … Read more

The Many Paintings of Water Lilies by Claude Monet

In this post, I will feature some of the paintings of water lilies by Claude Monet which were created during his lifetime. All up, I located a staggering 250-plus paintings of water lilies. This post is the third in a series where I discuss paintings of the same subjects by Claude Monet. Previously we discussed: … Read more

How Claude Monet Documented Light Using the Rouen Cathedral

This post follows on from How Claude Monet Used Haystacks To Demonstrate Light And Color. Here is another example of how Claude Monet painted the same subject in varying environments to demonstrate how changes in light can affect color. He used the Rouen Cathedral as the subject in 28 paintings which I could find, all of … Read more

How Claude Monet Used Haystacks to Demonstrate Light and Color

One of the best ways of learning how light and color work is to paint the same subject in different environments. Claude Monet did this all throughout his career, most notably demonstrated through his many haystack paintings. Claude Monet did so many paintings of haystacks you would think he had some kind of obsession with … Read more

Quotes by the Impressionist Master Claude Monet

Claude Monet (14 November 1840 – 5 December 1926) is one of my all-time favorite artists. He was a figurehead of the impressionist movement who used vibrant colors and bold strokes. In fact, the term impressionism in the painting world was derived from one of Claude Monet’s paintings named Impression, soleil levant (Impression, Sunrise). This painting was … Read more