Hay Daze Harvest Festival

What to do in Montana...

Hay Daze is a micro film that visually documents the “What the Hay?” celebration in central Montana. Each autumn hay growers memorialize cutting season by designing hay bale sculptures. The big, crazy bale sculptures are displayed right in their fields; a driving tour is really the best way to view each year’s creations. Hay Daze features super 8 footage of fantastical straw men, machines, and monsters. 

A spare soundtrack uses only nature’s sounds from the hay fields, giving each setting a feeling, which is at once peaceful and eerie. The approach presents the hay bale sculptures so that they drift from comedic to horrific to head-scratching. The viewer is left to wonder at what strange compulsion prods people to sculpt works of folk art in, let’s face it, barnyard food.  Or, maybe it is as Chagall has said: “Great art picks up where nature ends.”

The “What the Hay” event is organized by the Hobson Library/Museum and held annually the first Sunday after Labor Day in conjunction with the Utica Day Fair.  Visit www.montanabaletrail.com.