Fixing Mozart

This is a project I have been working for a long time. About two years ago, my bust of Mozart was accidentally swept off the piano by a power cord that was still plugged in due to my carelessness. He got a couple really small dings, but one corner was completely destroyed. I glued what could back together and then tried to fill the rest in with Cellu-clay (an instant paper-mâché). The Cellu-clay shrunk in the drying process and Mozart sat bewildered on my piano in his broken, eye-sore way for the next two years.


Fast-forward to the present. While thinking of what to do for the Desire 2 Create blog I decided to focus on projects that I have started and just not completed, with a few new things added for variety. Mozart floated to the top of the list.


Here he is in his two-year crumbled state.

Here is the corner after I added the air-hardening clay that I bought the same time I bought the Cellu-clay. I added a bit of water to it so the clay would go on more like a putty. Then let the poor man rest over night.

Once Mozart had dried out, I lightly sanded the clay area with fine sandpaper. I mixed two colors of metallic acrylic paint to come up with the closest possible color. Here is the first coat of paint on the corner.

I painted the whole bust because there were little dings everywhere that didn't need repaired other than a coat of paint. I used a foam brush and then a stiff brush from my daughter's water color set to make sure there were no globs of paint and that everything went on even. Here is the man half painted. Can you tell what side is painted and what side is not?

The shinier side is the new coat of paint. It had not yet dried. Pretty close in color, eh?

After the first coat of paint, I re-sanded the corner and painted again. Then to bring out some of the depth and detail I used my darker metallic paint as a glaze. I simply watered it down a bit. Painted over the highly detailed areas and then immediately lightly wiped the area with a rag so the darker paint would only stay in the crevices.

Here is the finished Mozart. He is not perfect, but at least I can put Beethoven in from of him and he won't be such an eye-sore in on my piano. My husband says he looks like Mozart is smiling more now. I know I am.