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Ray was born in Queens, New York. He spent his
childhood on Long Island and was raised alongside two sisters and one
brother.
At a very young age Ray showed a knack for art, a passion that his
mother approvingly encouraged him to pursue. Throughout his academic
career, Ray’s classmates and teachers also recognized his natural
artistic abilities. Ray graduated from the School of Visual Arts in New
York City in 1991.
However, also having a passion for children, he elected for a career in
teaching. From 1993 to 2006 Ray taught Art for students grade K-12 in
Bellaire, Michigan.
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It was during his teaching tenure that Ray began “dabbling” in pumpkin
sculpting, initially as projects with his students.
After several custom-carved requests from students’ parents, Ray
realized he was on to something with his pumpkins and started offering
them to local hotels and restaurants. It became his fall hobby for
several years.
Ray’s hobby of pumpkin sculpting was brought to an entirely new level in
2007 when he was contacted by High Noon Entertainment and asked to
participate in the Food Network’s Challenge Show, Outrageous Pumpkins.
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Ray competed as one of four professional pumpkin sculptors, impressed
the judges enough to sweep all three rounds and was awarded the Grand
Prize. Outrageous Pumpkins logged the highest ratings of any other
Challenge episode, and a second invitation was extended to Ray in 2009.
They wanted him to come back and defend his title in their Outrageous
Pumpkins Challenge II. Ray defended his 2008 title and took home the
2010 Grand Prize from the Food Network’s Pumpkin Challenge II.
The exposure of Ray’s style, talent and creativity amassed an all-new
appreciation for pumpkin “carving”, and his artistic take on the
traditional jack-o-lantern has granted him invitations from across the
globe for VIP Galleries (Very Impressive Pumpkins).
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Incredible art artist Ray Villafane. This young artist has created
several pieces in a pumpkin. This artist is inspired by Halloween,
pumpkin made a couple of zombies from the pumpkin. It did this from one
of the biggest pumpkin in the world. Everyone was thrilled with his
presence in the pumpkin art.
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