hr walnut ink

In November 2024 I was cleaning up an old grave site on top of a hill across our 'back pond' where my studio is. There is a marker reading 1850 on the site and next to it is an old black walnut tree. It's covered with different kinds of vines, fern like plants and is pretty withered. The two years prior we had a drought and the tree looked that next year, no leaves. However with return to normal wet rainy Louisiana conditions, this next year the tree looked its normal self. There were a mess of walnut seeds on the ground and on the tree. It was an idea that maybe I could harvest some to taste the walnuts. When looking up how to handle the walnuts I read about making walnut ink. It's simple enough, boil a bunch of the rinds and simmer down the liquid to concentrated ink. With 20 walnuts I made 2 full size mason jars of ink. I added some gum arabic to thicken it and some liquid iron to darken it. I also added a couple drops wintergreen liquid to keep it from getting moldy.

I have been drawing with it in life drawing group at LSU and have shared half a dozen 15ml pans with fellow drawers. The first drawings still look strong, not fading. The ink got a shade darker with the iron. It's a little greasy but works well with ink nib pens and with brushes as a water defused wash or 100%. It mixes well with water color to tone the ink washes. I have stained oak and cedar with the ink to good effect as well.

My ideal goal is to stabilize the ink so it is shelf steady. A couple times open containers have gotten small floaters of white mold. The worst was I mixed it with silkscreen media, the prints look great but two weeks later the jar was moldy like a Petri dish. The ink seems waterproof and the drawings all look to be aging great.

Next year I will make a couple gallons of ink. I am starting to invite fellow artist to the studio and it would be fun to have a house ink we can use without caution and splash it around on big drawings. Maybe I can make my own paper from home ranch grown pulp for a combo ink/paper unique to the site. I feel like it adds a dimension to my field studies that the ink was made here and people seem initially interested in what it's about. cheers MP 3.11.25

Here is a link to buy the first set of drawings made with the walnut ink by Mahoney Perkins that are on view at Nola Nacular Gallery in New Orleans March 7-24, 2025