Legalectric

Stephanie Henricksen has been a friend, activist, cohort, and client on so many land use issues for so long now, and though I’d seen her “Farm Art” show that she put together with many other farm and agriculture focused artists, I’d not seen a room full of her work… until today.  And apparently is was a side of her that many in Northfield did not know existed!  So good to fill them in.  It was the last day of her “Retrospective” at the Northfield Arts Guild.  That’s Stephanie in her “winter” hat discussing her work:

One day we were in my office talking about the Target development just south of Northfield, and, well, it was a spirited discussion, and I leaned back snorting and CRACK!  My chair broke, I went flying over backwards, hootin’ and hollerin’ all the way to the floor.  A few days later she comes in with a drawing of it, which I have to this day.  I also have an evocative photo of Stephanie, taken by David, on my wall, of her sitting with three of her many ducks who were assassinated in a drive by shooting just after she’d published an editorial about a local land use project — a price of her advocacy.  She’s had other incidents, including a sow’s teats skinned off and left in her mailbox, a rib cage stuck on her fence post, during her work on feedlot regulation.  She’s well known for her activism, but unfortunately, not so much for her art.

Oh, and did you know she’s an alto sax player too?

And some others from the exhibition:

This is her mother out in the yard:

This was one of my favorites — a squirrel ring toss!!!

This one was to be a “Madonna and Child” which she said just wasn’t working until she put her dog in:

And here she is again, Stephanie Henricksen and friends:

And from my personal collection from a much appreciated thank you note she’d sent in the heat of a tough struggle, after we’d made some progress on a land use issue.  I think we’d gotten a permit stalled out in Rice County with a petition to the EQB for environmental review: