From the Lifedrawing class.

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Comment by Jon Main on August 1, 2015 at 23:09

Linda - high key means that the darkest darks are not very dark = the painting is overall lght in tone (or maybe also that there are very very few deep darks) (so you're not using the lower part of the value scale),

low key, of course, means that darker/mid-dark values predominate. That's how I understand it, so far anyway - in this painting of yours the only dark (apart from accents like her eyes/toenails) is her hair and it's not so so dark...

Comment by Linda McNeill on August 1, 2015 at 6:20

Thanks, Pauline.

Comment by Pauline Le Merle on August 1, 2015 at 5:36

This is great Linda, quite difficult getting the hand and arm right in this kind of pose, high key means that you have used a lot of light tones to describe your painting keeping the dark/shadow areas lighter, just keeping everything lighter hope this is helpful.....:-}}

Comment by Linda McNeill on August 1, 2015 at 3:41

Thanks , Jon. Could you explain what you mean by "high key". I need all the help I can get.

Comment by Jon Main on August 1, 2015 at 3:38

Nicely high key and a good capture of her expression, Linda