I don’t often go on Twitter because it steals my life away, but I was on it for a while earlier today and shared a bit of a joke with some other women artists. We were all tomboys as kids and now we’re all grown up, we don’t do frocks and stilettos, fancy nails and killer heels. No, we slouch around in overalls, steel toecap safety boots and our nails are either full of ink and paint or chewed down to the quick. Manky Women Artists. MWAs, the new YBAs?
In keeping with the manky theme, here’s something I’m working on at the moment. I stretched some heavily soaked, ripped and distorted Arches paper, about size A0, against a large board and gave it a couple of coats of rabbit skin glue followed by a quick wash in yellow ochre acrylic as the ground. Then I used willow charcoal and compressed charcoal, scribbling and rubbing at random to get a varied background. I scrubbed at it with wire wool and sandpaper to pull out the highlights and now I’m putting in shadows and details with blocks of carbon. I normally work from life, but I’m trying to plumb the depths of my imagination with this one. It’s getting a bit Goya. And mucky.
If you’re a manky woman artist, come and join in on Twitter #MWA. If you’re a manky male artist, oo-er! Best keep that to yourself 
Blimey – fascinating approach
It’s fun – I like getting dirty…..
Guess I’ll be keepin’ to myself. But it’s nice to see what the other half is doing. Now, if only you’d do it in heels and Victoria’s Secret, then you’d be on to something.
[The devil made me write this].
pffftttt! I’ll be sticking to overalls and steelies
Its wonderfully robust, and I can see the Goya in there.
I’m enjoying doing it
I love this drawing and the process sounds absolutely delicious – scrubbing the surface with wire wool – looks great – can’t wait to see more and I love the sound of MWA
It’s great fun and it leaves a considerable element of chance, which I really like. And it’s a chance to get absolutely manky lol
I was looking at a large drawing by Nicolas Harding in the Jacarandah Drawing Prize on the week-end where the surface was very roughed up and torn (and wondered how he had accomplished this) I suspect you have have provided the key
and yes the chance element I love that too. Thanks with being so generous in your sharing of information.
British artist David Tress also rips into his drawings but you need very thick paper, 250gsm or more
Can’t wait to see how you develop it though at the moment it reminds me a little of a very expressive Henry Moore wartime drawing….
oh yes, it does. I’d forgotten about those
Oh boy, I love the texture and the dark/light contrast. But it’s looking a little intestinal to me. Maybe it’s supposed to? Even though I can detect two figure-like shapes within it. Quite mysterious and also provoking to the imagination!
I’m inspired by the legend of Lilith and I’m exploring her gestation, but it’s in its early stages at the moment. I think i’ll be a long-term topic for me