cast paper face LG - W.I.P. - gesso coat #1 - 7¾"x 5¼" x 2¼" face dimensions
The cast paper face was given to me in 2003 when a fellow faculty member was cleaning out her office as she left academia for a career 100% in fine art. Her subsequent painting and drawing career was very successful for about a dozen years when cancer cut it short. The paper casting sat untouched in a box in my studio for twenty years when I decided to get it out and work on it.Â
The first operation was to take the limp and floppy paper casting and mount it to a stiff backer so it could be presented in a well-defined fashion. To that end it was glued down with white glue to a cut-to-fit piece of 4-ply rag matboard on the reverse, and then further attached to a wedge-shaped backer to raise and float the forehead off the perpendicular plane by about 3/4 of an inch and leaving the chin floating-off about 1/4 inch off the plane. The paper casting was sealed with six coats of penetrating aerosol shellac to stiffen the fibers and make the surfaces more rigid. As shown, the front was lightly coated with a brushed-on acrylic gesso as the first of several coats to prime for the final finish. The face is photographed lying against a primed 8″x 10″ canvas.
At this point I have yet to decide whether the piece will be presented in a shadowbox or simply mounted on a backer of canvas or stone. Whichever presentation I select I am leaning towards a verdigris finish.
