Cornhusker

Artist / Maker Christian Petersen (Danish - American, 1885 - 1961)

Date1941

OriginUSA

MediumPainted plaster

Dimensions43 x 16 x 24 in. (109.2 x 40.6 x 61 cm)

ClassificationsSculpture

Credit LineGift of the Coppola Family in memory of Joseph M. Coppola, Sr. In the Christian Petersen Art Collection, Christian Petersen Art Museum, University Museums, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa. Conservation funding by John and Doris Salsbury.

Object numberUM99.329

Status

Not on view

Collections

Label TextInspired by a young man from Nevada, Iowa, who placed second in the national cornhusking championships in Davenport, Iowa in 1940, the "Cornhusker" was Christian Petersen's tribute to a uniquely midwestern type of athlete in the premechanized farm era. A time-honored tradition in agricultural states, cornhusking competitions were held at the county, district, sate and national levels. Petersen was fascinated with this particular competitor, Marion Link, who hand picked and husked forty0six bushels of Iowa field corn in eighty minutes. The "Cornhusker" and "4-H Calf" were commissioned by the Hotel Sheldon Munn in Ames, Iowa, and remains the artist's most obviously rationalistic studio works. The "Cornhusker" is more typical of Petersen's sculpture, with is simplicity of modeling and its concentration of a few major masses. As seen in many of Petersen's human forms, emphasis is placed on the hands and the importance of the work they do. They appear to move heavily but rhythmically with the figure's feet, giving the sculpture a feeling of methodical, efficent movement.

PeriodDepression Era

Published ReferencesIowa State Daily, Sept. 29, 1942; Des Moines Register, March 4, 1951; Des Moines Tribune, Nov. 26, 1942. Referred to as "The Iowa Champ" in Wallace's' Farmer, Col 68, Issue 1, 1943.

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