A Not Quite Great Pumpkin

 Yesterday when I was watching football with my father he pulled out something he wanted my help with.  An old wooden holiday item, flat boards, one basically a shelf, and rising vertically behind it  a background piece, in the shape of a pumpkin. It was painted to look like a jack-o-lantern, the idea being a potted plant can be placed on the flat shelf and the pumpkin would sit behind it.  It was pretty old, much of the paint worn off, whether it be from age or weather, but enough paint remained that it was clear what the image was supposed to be.  He wanted it repainted so he could use it for this coming Halloween. I told him I had no paint there in the basement, but I could probably figure something out.  Before I left, I had.   

For an image on paper, I'd have a bunch of options. Being that this is a wooden object, I thought of some of my recent wooden sculpture pieces, which I colored by painting them with water based relief ink, which I have in many colors.  And thanks to my color theory training,  I can use those colors to create all the others. Apply the ink thinly to the wood and it will dry on it, in whatever color I chose.  Figured it would be best to put on a background color, then paint objects on top of it- the holes in the jack-o-lantern (black). the leaves and vines (phthalo green) etc.  All those inks are in my Studio, so a visit to there was added to my list of errands for Monday.

My third stop this afternoon was at the Studio, picked up some inks. Down in Manasquan, did the lawn first, then my pumpkin project.

 

 Mixed an orange color using red, yellow, and white inks, and used a small soft brayer to put a thin layer over the whole pumpkin shaped piece of wood, then left it in the shed to dry overnight.  Everything else can wait until tomorrow. Halloween itself if still a few weeks away, so I'm not worried.  Applying ink with a brayer is not as precise as using a brush, so it's not as neat as the final version will be.