At school, she excelled at art, but struggled with other subjects due to an undiagnosed vision problem that, although eventually discovered and corrected at age 12, set her on a rebellious course during her formative years.

[9] After graduating, she worked and studied at Grazia Deruta Majolica Pottery, the Artists’ Union of Russia, Tomsk State University and Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity.

[2] Places that inspire her include the Pilbara, the Eastern Goldfields-Esperance area, the Kimberley and Tanami Desert, as well as landscapes in Pakistan, India, Russia and Italy.

[12][13] Drysdale went from an initial period of throwing bowls to making slab plates that she used as canvases for expressionistic drawing with coloured slips, glazes, and resists.

[4] Her early work is notable for eschewing the "brown sauce" that often douses craft pottery in favour of "complex colours and nervous decoration".

After residencies in Europe, the USA and Russia, during which she learned about majolica decoration and lustres, she produced the Totem and Carnivale series.

At this time Drysdale started a collaboration with master potter Warrick Palmateer, allowing her to concentrate on surface art while he threw the vessels.

[4] Drysdale moved from the toxicity of waxes and lustres to the much safer Liquitex medium, which also allowed her to further refine her line work.

Coalescing all these influences and ideas together, Drysdale arrived at her signature style of intense colour and fine linework in the first Tanami series called Red Desert (Frankfurt, 2003), which was a great success.

[4] Her technique encompasses the selection of a suitable vessel, the adding the layers of glaze, then the careful linear incisions with a knife through a masking resist to inscribe the tracery that defines and shapes each work.

Because the masking medium quickly dries into a form too hard to inscribe, Drysdale can work only on one small section at a time.

[19]Drysdale's studio for the last 30 years has been her home in the port of Fremantle, a worker's cottage, now heavily renovated, bought for her by her father.