Pumpkin Masterpiece News

It doesn’t bother Inegah Mandra that some of his best pieces of art end up in the garbage.

Actually, the 35-year-old transplant from Bali kind of prefers it that way. Which really helps when your canvas is a pumpkin.

“I actually really like that part,” he said of the ephemeral nature of his work. “It means you always have a chance to start again.”

But it’s not like it’s easy to part with Mandra’s work. His pumpkins are intricate tapestries in orange where dragons chase each other amid flowers and symbols rooted in Asian mythology. Jack-o’-lanterns they are not.

Mandra doesn’t hollow out his pumpkins. They remain intact, his carving tools rarely cutting more than a few sixteenths of an inch into the apricot-colored flesh.

Pumpkins don’t offer a very broad palette to begin with, and by not hollowing out the fruit Mandra also gives up the ability to use candlelight shining from inside to produce a range of shades. So his colors are limited to dark orange, light orange and near-white.

“What I’m trying to do is make a contrast with those three colors and bring out the pattern,” he said.

Mandra isn’t a pumpkin artist by trade. He’s working part time at Cafe Lucky Noodle in Eugene while taking classes at Pacific University, preparing to be an elementary school teacher.

But his hobby is carving elegant masks and reliefs in wood, skills he applies to his pumpkins. He does it mostly for pleasure, but he’s taken on a few commissions as his work has become noticed and now does about a dozen stylish pumpkins each Halloween season.Mandra has lived in the United States for a dozen years, having moved here with his wife from Bali, the Indonesian island where he was born. He recalls his surprise during his first Halloween season at seeing people carve up and display something that serves a much more prosaic purpose at home.

“They just eat them,” he said. “The first time I did it (pumpkin carving) in front of my in-laws, they said, ‘Oh my gosh, what are you doing?’ ”

But it really wasn’t such a big leap. In Bali, Mandra said people celebrate a somewhat similar holiday, in March, when they assemble elaborate ritual offerings of fruits and vegetables and flowers for the spirits of the underworld. A central part of the offerings are scary figurines representing the spirits.

“Then the whole community parades them around the town, and then they burn them,” he said. Here today, gone tomorrow; just like a Halloween pumpkin.

“I like that idea very much because I think that’s what art should be, growing and changing over time,” he said.

Mandra has carved a variety of scenes and even logos into pumpkins for his custom jobs, but what inspires his own works are mythological Chinese dragons. He etches complex, fanciful figures with intricate wings, bulging eyes and flowing manes, coaxing them from the orange skin with the same tools he uses in woodcarving.

He chooses his pumpkins carefully. He prefers big ones — 35 to 40 pounds — with smooth skin and a uniform shape that runs more toward tall rather than round.

Mandra will comb grocery store bins and roadside stands for the best specimens, and he notes that this hasn’t been the best year for the larger pumpkins he favors. Most are smaller this season, he said.

It takes him about six hours to complete a carving. And even though Halloween is looming, he said he could still be talked into turning out a few more (prices vary; he can be contacted by e-mail at mandramingo@yahoo.com or by phone at 683-8830).

And if his style of leaving the pumpkin whole takes away some of the spookiness of the traditional American jack-o’-lantern, leaving the pumpkin whole does give his carvings an edge in durability. Because it isn’t hollowed out, a Mandra pumpkin will still be going strong long after the hollow ones have turned to mush.

“Last year I had one that lasted nine months,” he said.