INDIANAPOLIS — The Indiana State Fair recently wrapped up its 15 day run, seeing a slight increase from 2024’s attendance at 854,977. Many new attractions, including the Big Top Circus and Free Stage shows, pulled thousands.
Nearly 10,000 Hoosiers participated and entered over 50,000 entries throughout competitions across the fairgrounds. Included in that number were 550 works of art in all mediums.
The Best of Show award for the Indiana Artist Exposition went to a sculpture by David Sparks. The winner of Excellence in Painting was Jeffery Bottoms, and Excellence in Watercolor went to Bob Meyers (shown here).
The Giant Pumpkin weighed in at 1,323 pounds, and more than 32,000 canned goods were built into towering sculptures in the CANstruction exhibit — the canned food was then donated to Gleaners Food Bank. The cheese sculpture weighed in at 1,600 pounds of Indiana cheese, sculpted by Sara Kauffman, the Cheese Lady.
For a complete list of award winners, visit indianastatefair.com/p/competitions1
