Celebrating International Women's Day with a new painting

I have really been in a painting-frenzy lately. It helps that I have an exhibition coming up to get my ass into gear. It's always like that, I keep procrastinating until I have just very little time left, and then I start and can't stop anymore. There are paintings everywhere in the house in different stages of completion. My son (after clearing away paint and paintings from the table in order to be able to eat his fruit) mentioned I really need a studio. Well, he's right about that ;-)

The painting I finished this week is all about women. Pure coincidence, because I'd completely forgotten about International Women's Day being tomorrow. It's a canvas that has been patiently waiting on my easel until I knew what to do with it. I loved the background and was hesitant to put something on top of it. But I couldn't leave it like it was either.

And then one night, I was reading the news on the internet and read an article about a law in a certain country that would make it virtually impossible to prosecute and punish men that abused their mothers/wife/sisters/daughters ... because of a ban on relatives testifying. 

And it made me so angry. And sad. And helpless. Thinking about all the women in a much too big part of the world who are treated as second-class citizens, who are beaten and raped and forced to marry a man who is forty years older and can do with them as he wishes. Societies where it's normal to treat women as dirt, where they have no rights whatsoever, where no one stands up for them, where little boys learn from a young age that women are inferior to them. Societies where women get stoned to death for being raped by men that cannot control themselves, where little girls are killed because they dare to dance ....

It sickens me. And it should sicken every single one of us. Don't those men realize they wouldn't even exist without a woman. They thank their very lives to a woman. Women should be respected if only for that.

So the next day when I walked into the kitchen and saw my canvas standing there, I got the idea to make it a celebration of women. Women rising up from whatever hell they're living in, and reaching for the light and for a better life. Women that won't be beaten down, that won't be silenced, that will keep speaking up until they receive the respect they deserve.

Because I wanted the background to shine through I used acrylics with lots of glazing liquid. I have rediscovered my glazing liquid. Years ago I did an online painting workshop with Julie Prichard and Chris Cozen where I learned how to use glazing liquid (it was an excellent workshop by the way, called "Chaos & Calm"). But the last years I kinda forgot about it. Until I recently used it for the 29 faces challenge and fell in love all over again :-)

I like how you can still see all the drips from the background through the figures. For me it's also like a symbol of all the tears and blood that's been shed by women all over the world.

I called it "You will never get me down". It's a big canvas, 30x100 cm (11,8"x 39,4"), which makes it a bit hard to photograph. Also to paint actually, quite a few times I almost swept everything off the kitchentable by moving it around ☺

Thanks so much for all the comments on my previous PPF-post! Most of you thought I shouldn't put any quote on there, so I just darkened the edges a bit and will leave it like this for now. It's one of the paintings that will go to the exhibition, and I'll just see how it looks when it hangs there. I can still add something later. I called it "I'll find my way home".

That's it for now. I'm still having lots of fun making new images for my Society6-shop. Really, I can't stop, it's addictive. And there's more good news: the promo on FREE worldwide shipping has gotten an upgrade and now there's also a 5$ discount on every item in my store. Did I say already that I love Society6? The promo is on until March 9th midnight, and only if you follow this link.
Here's another new image that I added last night:

Thanks also for those of you that started following me on Pinterest! I've added some more boards, and I'm starting to understand how it all works (phew, felt a bit dumb there...). And I'm starting to discover new boards all the time ..... ooohhh, I really need more hours in a day ....

And my last thank you is for you who's visiting me here. Thanks for being here, for commenting, for giving me your opinion. I hope your day is being awesome, and the weekend will even be better. Sharing this again with my weekly favorite: Paint Party Friday! ♥ ♥ ♥