Interview: Girls Drawin’ Girls

Girls Drawin’ Girls has brought together a group of women working in the animation industry for the common goal of creating sexy pin up art from a distinctly fun and girly perspective. We talked to founder Melody Severns about Girls Drawin’ Girls at Comicon 2007.

PRG: How did Girls Drawin’ Girls get started?

Melody Severns: Girls Drawin’ Girls got started about a year ago when my friend Anne [Walker] and I were thinking about collaborating on a project. We knew a bunch of women and thought it would be fun to get together and have an all female art project.

There is so much pin up are done predominantly by men and we wanted to change that and do an entire book of pin ups drawn by women. Who would know what’s sexy better than a woman?

We have our pin up book, Girls Drawin’ Girls: A Girl in Time, and it has images from cave women and into the future. We drew all of the time periods out from a hat so we didn’t get a million people all wanting the 50s, which is a very popular era. I got the 1980s and, somehow, I had to make shoulder pads sexy.

PRG: And did you manage to make the shoulder pads sexy?

MS: I did the best I could.

PRG: Is Girls Drawin’ Girls a direct response to negative stereotypes in this artistic area?

MS: It was just time we did something different. Most pin up art done by men features huge breasts, tiny waists and out of control proportions that don’t make sense. That can happen here as well, but we’re tyring to say that women are allowed to be sexy and fun and go wherever they want with their femininity and sexuality and still be intelligent and get by doing their own thing.

PRG: Are there any examples that jump to mind, an especially egregious example of the out of control proportions you mentioned?

MS: I don’t know if I want to mention anything in particular, but I think you can see that in most [superhero] comic book characters or even just looking at pin up art here at the Con.

Don’t get me wrong, some of it is wonderful art, but it’s mostly all done by men. And that’s the big thing we were trying to do differently: have fun and draw girly art.

PRG: How are the giant breasts and small waists in superhero comics any different than the broad shoulders and impossible musculature that men are drawn with?

MS: I don’t see that that’s there is much of a difference. I find the proportions on men in comic books to be ridiculous as well. It’s all fantastical and I think a lot of times when men get summed up that way it’s not seen as anything, but when it happens to a woman it can be objectifying.

With us doing it, people kind of see that you can make it OK to be sexy. There is some art in the book that show larger proportioned women, but it doesn’t have to be big boobs and tiny waists. We just want to be out to say that we can do what we want and it will still be fine and still make good art.

PRG: Are there other female pin-up artists that you look up to yourself?

MS: I look up to everyone in our group. I also think another good one is kat von d, a tattoo artist who does great pin up art. As far as pin up artists are concerned, I don’t think there are many [women] out there.

PRG: How did you go about gathering the artists to contribute to the book?

MS: It’s kind of weird actually because a lot of us work in the animation industry, which is so tightly knit. I knew my friend Anne and some people I work with and went to art school with, so I asked some of those people and they also asked their friends. It spiderwebbed from there. We’re always recruiting and always finding new people. It’s turning into something huge that I wasn’t really expecting.

Girls Drawin’ Girls: A Girl in Time is available for purchase at the group’s website, where you can also read more about the contributors and view images from the book.

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