Lumpy Bumpy Background

[materialgirl197]

I'm doing the 8x8 Jigsaw Swap and I have an idea for one of the pieces but I'm not quite sure how to do it.
I want to make the entire background of the piece lumpy and bumpy.

The theme of the piece is Native American and I want to make the background swirly gold - like the bottom picture - but I want it to be tactile and lumpy. How would I do that? I was thinking of using acrylic gold paint as the base but I'm not quite sure how do get the tactile effect.

Any tips.

[dozyrosy]

I've used (stencil) embossing paste on ATCs to give a raised textured effect - heating it with a heat gun will cause it to bubble and blister and creates some great textures, so it might be worth giving this a try. I have some unknown brand pastes and some made by Dreamweaver, and it comes in all sorts of colours, including metallics. I believe you can also mix the white with a little acrylic paint to colour it.

I use a pallette knife to daub the paste on fairly thickly and roughly, then "draw" on it with a cocktail stick to move bits around, and maybe heat it up till some areas bubble; you can the squidge or pop the bubbles to get different effects again.

If you want more regular textures there are also all sorts of different texture/embossing plates you can use, and I've occasionally seen some bubbly type papers and cardstock.

HTH, Rosemary

[materialgirl197]

Rosemary - that is exactly the background I want to do - thanks for the tip. Off to hunt for some embossing paste

[Freedom]

This is a piece I made using handmade paper soaked with gravy browning and water. Arrange the wet paper into folds on absorbent surface and using a large sponge (car sponges are great)press hard on the paper to soak up some of the moisture. Leave to dry overnight and you get a beautifully textured paper.
Another way is to use tissue and PVA.

[materialgirl197]

That is brilliant Freedom. I'm def gonna give that a go.