#FEMbruary Challenge Complete: Catherine the Great!

My contribution to the FEMbruary challenge, a 28mm metal figure of Catherine the II of Russia is now finished! Here is the great lady herself astride her grey; Brilliant.

In a previous post, I observed how this Bad Squiddo figure was cleverly based upon an original portrait of the empress painted by a Swede named Vigilius Eriksen. You can observe below just how my figure compares with it’s original inspiration:

I’ve based her on a kind of rough track, complete with grasses and flowers, on her way to suggest to her husband Peter III that he should maybe consider abdicating in favour of her. Something about the sharpness of her glittering sword lends further weight to her suggestion…

I used a shade of blue for her sash appropriately called “Royal Blue”, which I think looks the business.

Getting her face ‘satisfactory’ was an interesting challenge what with me not being used to painting female faces. It’s always easier to create an acceptable looking face when it’s covered over with a luxuriant moustache or bushy beard! That’s one terrific thing about FEMbruary – guiding me into neglected territory. I’m pleased to say that – no doubt thanks more to the sculptor than the painter – I think the face looks suitably feminine.

Catherine’s long hair can be seen to cascade down her back, tied with a black bow.

And after that admittedly modest submission, and with the end of February fast approaching, I bow out of #FEMbruary. If FEMbruary in some way encourages more women into the hobby; encourages more appropriate female miniatures to be manufactured; or just enables us bloke modellers to reconsider female figures and their portrayal more carefully, then all to the good.

I urge visitors to check out the realistic female miniatures on Annie Norman’s splendid Bad Squiddo Games site and also check out some of the other participants terrific work:

• Lead Balloony – our original instigator of FEMbruary – has been busy!
• Some FEMbruary top heroines and splashes of war-paint on Imperial Rebel Orc’s excellent blog!
• Man of Tin’s Mark tackles tea-drinking Land Girls in his latest in a series of splendid FEMbruary- related posts
• Convert or Die’s displays a terrific 1000 year old witch (no – that’s not how long he’s had the figure)!
• Azalel’s Bitz Box blog on the FEMbruary challenge
• Eternal Hunt provides a FEMbruary figure with the very impressive Interrogator Chastity of the Ordo Hereticus
• High Times on the Eastern Fringe meanwhile gives us with a FEMbruary makeover…