Rudquist is also a great fan of the fair. He is especially taken with the chickens and rabbits, who, he considers, exhibit the same physical variety as his human subjects. "They're like people in that we're all essentially the same, but we differ in wonderful and interesting ways. I plan to spend lots of time with the rabbits. If you see me wandering around the fair, that's where I'm headed."
Though Rudquist sold "Petunia"--his entry this year is an academic portrait of a luxuriously bearded old art-school chum--he has not entirely retired his pig. He recently finished a sequel to the original painting, "After the Fair," which features a rather bloody pork chop superimposed on a ghosted background of the original Petunia--a vivid reminder to fairgoers that the animal barn and the pork-chop-on-a-stick stand are only one stop down the assembly line from one another.
Craig Lassig
Profiles in diligence: State Fair art-barn curators Pat and Bob Crump
Related Content
More About
The big night for Rudquist and his fellow artists is the Tuesday before the fair's public opening, when hundreds of contestants, friends, and well-wishers crowd into the art barn to find out who will take home the blue ribbon. For some of the artists, it is the first time their work has been seen by the public. Others are old hands, and circulate through the sweaty throng, shaking hands with friends and offering congratulations or consolations. Despite the crowd and the conspicuous absence of climate control, the mood is jubilant--as advertised, a great get-together.
Early in the evening, there is an excited shriek from one corner of the gallery. Linda Brown, a middle-aged watercolorist from Chaska, has just learned that her entry, a picture of turtles piling over one another, has won a second-place ribbon. "It's the ultimate thrill," she exclaims. "It's all the best artists in Minnesota. For us to be exposed and to meet all the other artists. It's just so exciting."
"It's the Academy Awards of art shows," her companion, who has also won, adds. "This is the largest fair show in the country. I've seen other shows, and they just don't compare." Brown poses in front of her turtles for a photo, smiling widely.
A little later on, the crowd begins to drift out into the cool evening. The lights of the Midway are on now, flashing orange and red and green against the violet backdrop of the sky.
"What'd you think?" a woman asks her husband as they wander off.
"To each his own," he says. "To each
his own."
Which seems about as graceful an appreciation of the art barn--and, hell, art itself--as anyone is likely to come up with.
The State Fair Fine Art Exhibition is on display through September 4 at 1442 Cosgrove St.; (651) 642-2200.
