2026 Minnesota State Fair Fine Arts Preview

Where I live, the surest harbinger of the end of summer is The Minnesota State Fair.

It runs for ten days, starting in late August and ending on Labor Day. The Fair’s Fine Art Competition Previewis usually on the warmest day of late August. It has been covered here numerous times, even when I didn’t get in (i.e., this year.) With 8 categories and as many judges, the result is always a mixed bag. This years competition proved to be no different, and the sweltering heat at the preview was also the same. The best category this year was Textiles and Fabrics with several fine works in what is usually an ignored area. Overall, I sensed a lack of FUN in the entries, which was always a redeeming factor in previous shows.

Trump’s ICE occupation of Minneapolis was noted in paintings and photographs:

J. A. Anderson’s In the Winter of ’26

Textiles were ably represented by Erik Jon Olson’s Once There Were Green Fields:

And Jan Rapacz’s Grief: 365 days:

Photography was especially weak this year, lots of mediocre monochromes and garden-club pics of flowers. There were a few standouts, among them was this mysterious study by Tiffany Bolk, Grandma’s Lipstick:

Posing with one’s entry makes for good for people watching.

Elizabeth Putnam, Consolidated Rupture:

Kristina Jager, Salt:

Kellie Kvern, Sanctuary:

Lindsay Kim, Happiness Retrived:

How I Spent My Summer Vacation II

Fleeting glimpses of spectral creatures in the campfire:

Fire Sprites:

Fire Dragon:

Fire Cyclops:

How I Spent My Summer Vacation I

“Postcards” from Elm Island Lake, Aitkin Country, Minnesota.

Idyllic Beach:

Flaming Sunset:

Scrollin’ by the Campfire:

Rustic Bunkhouse:

Osprey Nest:

Another Saturday Night

Twenty Years Ago on FITK

… Another Saturday night and I ain’t got nobody,
I got some money, ’cause I just got paid…
How I wish I had someone to talk to,
I’m in an awful way"
-Sam Cooke

A ritual in hundreds of cultures, for thousands of years, and billions of people. It could almost be called a rite of passage, except that the ritual is so sloppy.  When the aim is internal chaos, how can anything be named as such?

The work week’s hard light of mundane reality is softened by a little alcohol, or extinguished by a lot. The Mystery is not revealed, but it cab be ignored for awhile. The results of such actions may be hilarious, or hideous, or, more likely, somewhere in between.

We still indulge. We still meet socially. The cleverest monkeys must amuse themselves and each other. And if the night doesn’t end well, that may be something worth experiencing also.

Salka and Hekla x4

Iceland Airwaves, Iðno, November 5, 2025:

Salka Valsdóttir and Hekla Magnusdóttir, Iceland Airwaves, 2025

Three Eyes of God

Three stories. Disconnected.

Twenty Years Ago on FITK

Thin strands of hair congregated like rope splinters to hang down in front of his eyes, hanging in the soft summer gravity, making me furious, twitching my hand with primal anxiety.

I awaited the perfect moment to strike and it came so I struck.

Reaching out to swipe the playful strands of hair from his eyes and saying to him, "Life is like the opposite of gymnastics in that the only scores that count are your highest and lowest."

He processed what I said, refined it and refined it like sugar or meat. He turned back to me and said, "Well, I suppose I'm ready for either of the two tonight."

And with that we retired and made love that was altogether somewhere in the middle.

---

During the next few days I would be overcome by frequent bouts of severe stomach pain.
Driving me to the ground as if, for once, humbled.
My landlord took notice and drove me to the hospital.
Where doctors performed a stomach pump.
And extracted three crystallized butterflies.
Like dinosaurs in tar.
And sent me home.

---

She crossed her heart and hoped to die and did.
The doctors stating cause of death as a block of blood flow to the aorta.
Cross a heart too many times and it tears like folded paper.
Promises are whores but he was just a man passed off as a boy,
Trying to cut back.

---

~RS

Reposted

Departure Lounge Yoga

There is nothing like some carefully chosen yoga routines to prepare one for a long flight.

Downward Crouching Dog (with bag);

Extended No-Foot:

Non-Reversed Prayer:

Double Garland (seated):

Table for Anderson… Party of Six

Morrison County, Minnesota, July, 1918

From the Oscar Anderson archives.

Coffee

Twenty Years Ago on FITK

It was a strange rendezvous, this meeting in a funky coffeehouse in Moorhead, Minnesota.

How she ended up on that lonesome prairie was a long story that I was eager to hear. We had graduated together, done a few things in college with each other, and then drifted apart, she was on a career track, while I was spinning my wheels. Then we both got married, she moved away, and then we both had kids, and then: silence. Finally, at the thirty year reunion, we saw each other again, and it was good.

But this meeting was different. A date of sorts, social intercourse reduced to its most basic level: Man+Woman, coffee+pastries, in a quiet+private place to open up and be together. In high school we had shared many moments of comradery, exchanging views on the world and its dilemmas. I was crazy in love with her, but I knew that our paths were to diverge, and after graduation the private school/community college class divisions became all too apparent. There would be some subtle comparing of notes at this affair but I hoped it wouldn't get in the way of our rediscovery.

And then there she was, walking up from her car, and it was good again. The eyes are the window to the soul? They were certainly an ageless constant in her appearance. We selected our light comestibles and beverages and then retreated to a back room, sat down, and let our rivers flow. As we spoke, the music in the background changed from lively pop to more emotional soul, and considering the circumstances, it was appropriate fare:

Me and Mrs. Jones, we got a thing going on,
We both know that it's wrong
But it's much too strong to let it cool down now.

We meet ev'ry day at the same cafe,
Six-thirty I know she'll be there,
Holding hands, making all kinds of plans
While the jukebox plays our favorite song.

Me and Mrs., Mrs. Jones, Mrs. Jones, Mrs. Jones,
Mrs. Jones got a thing going on,
We both know that it's wrong,
But it's much too strong to let it cool down now.

We gotta be extra careful
that we don't build our hopes too high
Cause she's got her own obligations and so do I.

Me, me and Mrs., Mrs. Jones, Mrs. Jones, Mrs. Jones,
Mrs. Jones got a thing going on,
We both know that it's wrong,
But it's much too strong to let it cool down now.

Well, it's time for us to be leaving,
It hurts so much, it hurts so much inside,
Now she'll go her way and I'll go mine,
But tomorrow we'll meet the same place, the same time.

Me and Mrs. Jones, Mrs. Jones, Mrs. Jones.

As the tune ended, I thought I saw a small smile pass over her lips.