Romancing the Stone

Hate to reapeat a post and all, but this isn't a true repeat. In an effort to keep the wee portrait of my husband from getting squished, I baked the Fimo relief in the oven yesterday. This morning I got a chance to fool around with painting some sort of patina on it to bring out the shadows. It was totally experimental. I started with sepia-toned watercolors and while it took time to work out, it was a failure. There is a suble undertone to liquid watercolors (which are the only kind I keep on hand) that separates as it dries. Kept turning too yellow or green depending on the color used. The upside was that it washed off the Fimo with absolutely zero staining.

So I switched over to gouache....black gouache, in fact, in an effort to cut to the chase. Anyhoo, it worked well, but I learned pretty late that it stains, lightly. I also figured out that I needed to be sort of particular about where I painted it on more heavily and where not to put it at all. In the end, it turned out OK. Now I just need to mount it somehow in a shadow box or something.