Black light pumpkin patch project delights students as Halloween arrives

Mill Road Elementary students are enjoying a seasonal black light art show courtesy of the school’s artists.
Maria Taylor’s fourth grade art students created a pumpkin patch of glowing sculptures in a classroom using black light paint, and second grade students contributed glow-in-the-dark dot artwork for the walls. Each class in the school was invited to come for an “indoor field trip” to the classroom and leave their comments on the art on a large sheet that also glowed.
The installation was inspired by a lesson on Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama, who utilizes polka dots in her work and creates “infinity rooms,’ in which she uses mirrors to make dot-filled spaces appear to extend out forever.
“She makes pumpkin lanterns and rooms that appear to go on for infinity,” Taylor said. “Our take is, we can’t make pumpkin lanterns but we can still make pumpkins that glow.”
Taylor said students used recycled newspaper and plaster to make the pumpkin sculptures before decorating them with fluorescent paint while working in the black light.
Taylor, a first-year teacher at the school, thinks it’s the first time Mill Road students have created an in-school black light art installation.
“We did it as a pop-up so the kids could take their pumpkins home on Halloween,” she said, “which they desperately want to.”