Art Scale Little Sisters of Purification

When 28mag announced their Female Space Marine challenge, I was immediately excited to participate. The lack of women in the forces of the Adeptus Astartes has bothered me for quite some time, and this was a perfect chance to explore the idea of women as Space Marines.

Of course it should go without saying that female Space Marines would be barley distinguishable from their male counterparts, especially when wearing their massive power armour, and I made no changes from my usual approach to making art scale Marines. This isn’t even the first time I’ve made a female Space Marine either, as my Carcharodon Lieutenant, Kyras Redmaw, is also a woman.

The single distinctly feminine feature of the squad is one umhelmed Marine, showing off her rad sidecut and blue hair. This was mostly done to poke fun at the shittier side of the fanbase, who love to complain about ‘SJW’ types coming in and ruining their hobby, but also as a fun way to make sure at least one member was clearly and definitively a woman. For those curious, the head was taken from one of the Stormcast Eternal kits, which fit perfectly with the size of Space Marines.

I freehanded the chapter symbol based off of the fantastic work by Fabalah, which proved to be a bit of challenge, but a bit of patience and tackling it in small steps made it much easier. I’m quite happy with how it turned out too, and it was a great chance to continue practising my freehand skills in general.

I’m quite happy with how the Squads Sergeant turned out. Armed with a Plasma Pistol and Power Fist, I added a classic back banner and additional power cables to her, aiming for a slightly more retro vibe, and of course the ever fantastic Mark 6 armour, a personal favourite of mine. The Plasma Pistol was taken from the Chaos Space Marine range, as I liked how large and chunky it felt.

Overall I’m very happy with how the whole squad turned out, and I’m thrilled to have been able to participate in the challenge. It’s also been such a blast seeing a large portion of the community welcome women into the Astartes with their own female Space Marines, and even a fair few Little Sisters of Purification among them. Be sure to check out the various entries over on Instagram under the #28magchallenge hashtag.