Exercise: Colour used to evoke mood

I was aiming for a dark and sinister effect with this painting, so I used muted colours: greens, blues and reds.
I would say the outcome achieved its purpose in that respect.
I felt that I handled the paint better in the cloth and the chilli pepper this time.

In the later stages of the cloth I softened the shadows with burnt umber, ultramarine, cadmium red and white, the same mix as on the tip of the cloth fold - done with  thicker paint . Pthallo blue was used for a similar but cooler mix  towards the candle. Scrubby dry mixes were applied to some areas ie. the candle, more solid opaque paint to the rock and semi-transparent glazes (or washes) to tone down the right side of the candle last of all. I like the cadmium red dabs on the rock, it emphasizes contrasts with the green. The same shade of red is used in the foreground and seems to lift the area slightly from the muted surrounding hues. As in the first painting of this scene, where the chilli pepper looks very dominant  I  think, it  still looks a little dominant in the second one but less so, and the angle is different.  It looks like a strange nondescript object here but that seems to go with the rest of the painting in a slightly surreal way. It does however look rather uniform, so I think it would benefit from a little variation at least.