Mel Reese is an abstract formalist painter based in Brooklyn. Moving between the familiar and intangible, she traces the contours of land, body, and mind to conjure the immediacy of life through line, shape, color, and form.

Her current series, “Delta Daydreams,” is drawn from a 2023 residency in the Mississippi Delta. Suspended in time and drenched in water, she was steeped in the creative as well as destructive force of nature. This surreal experience of the South inspired a fresh investigation of body and landscape—a relationship made visceral through the use of water as not only muse but medium. She utilizes an array of water-based media such as acrylic paint, Caran D’Ache, and water-soluble oil pastels. Manipulation of each material creates a variety of textures, depths, and moments. These combine to create a quiet yet portentous composition.

A tale of the battle between “progress and destruction,” her work explores this complex dichotomy—which is so precariously poised between the human experience and our crumbling world—in search of beauty.