The Artist Who Sculpts Busts Out Of Butter
San Diego, California, is the home of artist Linda Christensen, but her long-held association with Minnesota is the key to her renown.
She is considered the world’s foremost butter sculptor, and at the end of every summer she takes pride of place at the Minnesota State Fair where she live-sculpts a bust of a local competition winner for all to see.
SANDWICH: Just to add some context to what you do, can you explain what a state fair is?
LINDA CHRISTENSEN: Early in the settlement era, states were vying for population and business, and they did that by trying to advertise their wares. Minnesota, for instance, was a dairy state. Florida had their orange groves and that sort of thing. State fairs started as an agricultural thing. They tried to get people to come and look and get involved in whatever it was that they were trying to promote. They were boosters, which is the word for it: they were trying to boost local economies.
For the public or for business?
For everything, because they were trying to attract settlers. Then it became a business where entertainment took over. Now it’s a big mish-mash of some of the craziest things. They have things like fried alligator on a stick at one stand, and the next one there’s deep fried butter chunks. It’s that sort of thing.
A lot of deep frying then?
Oh yes. There’s a lot of wanton eating going on. And then there’s different venues for bands and presentations.
What’s unique about the Minnesota State Fair?
It is, arguably, the largest state fair in America. People come for days on end because it takes so long to get through. Women bring their canned goods, and there are quilting projects where people compete for blue ribbons.
Do you remember the first time you ever attended one?
I have some memories of my first state fair. I had a little piggy bank and I broke it in order to get my 32 cents out to take to the state fair. Back then, 32 cents was quite a lot. I don’t remember what I spent it on, but I do remember that we came early in the day, and stayed until very late in the evening. And the thing I remember most was the ferris wheels and merry-go-rounds all turned their lights on after it got dark out. It was incredibly beautiful. I think I was about six or seven, so it would’ve been the late 1940s.
What was the year that you first became involved in the fair?
My love of the state fair is a separate thing from the butter sculpting because I got married and had two children and decided I wanted to go to art school, so I went and graduated and, just about that time, they decided to restart a tradition that was practiced in about the mid-1800s. People were doing butter sculpting quite a long time before refrigeration. One of the first sculptures made during that time was a life-sized rendition of Teddy Roosevelt and he’s wearing a pith helmet and a gun and he has his foot on a lion’s carcass.
What’s your process for producing butter sculptures?
I complete a sculpture in a cooler while a crowd watches. Back then [in the 1800s] they would make it ahead of time and it would just be there.
Were you studying classic sculpture in art school?
No, I was doing kinetic sculpture for the first two years.There was no way to get classical training in figurative art in the late ’60s and early ’70s, though I did have one quite helpful instructor who spent some time with me. I guess I’m self-taught. What I wound up doing for the butter sculpting would probably sit under portraiture, because that’s what I do.
How do you select your subjects each year?
So the dairy association I work with hosts a competition among women in the dairy industry. Among farmer’s daughters, actually. They compete and there’s 12 finalists, and the winner is crowned "Princess Kay of the Milky Way". The judging starts in May, then the finalists are chosen in early August, and then by mid-August, and the night before the fair starts, they crown the finalist. We start the next morning—she comes in the cooler, it’s 38 degrees in there, there’s a wind chill because they have to keep fans blowing so the window remains defrosted. It’s about a ten-by-ten hexagon glass enclosure. The floor revolves and it’s elevated, so the crowds can stand around and we’re both in there dressed in winter clothes. And every day I do one of the girls from a 90lb block of butter.
Is it medically permissible for you to be working in such cold conditions for so long?
I can be in there for, at the absolute most, an hour and a half.
Do you still use the same tools and implements?
Someone stole all my tools in the ’90s, but I’ve had the tools I have now for about 30 years. Some clay tools fall apart and I have to buy new ones. I have a trusty old knife and I use clay-cutting wires, and these clay tools that are like sticks with a hoop on the end.
What happens to the sculptures after you’ve completed them?
Well, that’s the real story! These things go on to have a life of their own after they leave the fair. I have gotten so involved with the whole rural and farm community because they just love these things. You have a small town with a population of 1,000 people, and one of the farm girls from their area will have a butter sculpture done, and they’ll put a big banner up on the main street of their town, and they’ll get some kind of chiller cabinet display case and they’ll put it in their shrine or their Elk club or something. Or the local restaurant might take it. And it becomes this attraction that people will go to look at. The last I heard, there’s one sculpture I did that has been in a family freezer for over 30 years.
Do you only do female subjects?
Mainly, but I get calls to do other subjects. I did a sculpture of Conan O’Brien out of 300lbs of white chocolate. And then I fried up some bacon for his hair.
