Corn maze creator uses cavemen to depict human belligerence

Kristi Sakk, creator of the giant corn maze at Toretalu farm, told ERR’s Vikerraadio that this year’s design shows cavemen with large clubs, reflecting what she called human belligerence.

The maze in Uuevälja village, Põltsamaa municipality, is open for the 15th time and can be visited until the end of September. Sakk said the design is created by placing 600 stakes in the field to form an imaginary grid, then cutting the image into the corn.

“I walk ahead with the picture on squared paper, and my husband follows with a trimmer,” Sakk said, describing the process as purely manual work. She said the final design is chosen through discussions with her husband and is intended to address an issue that is important in the world at that moment.

“If we take two long steps back from the wars happening now, nothing has really changed. We still take our big clubs and attack one another,” Sakk said.

The maze is also a map-reading game. Visitors search for checkpoints and receive a small candy prize after finding them all. Sakk said the corn is now taller than visitors in most places, and some people have found the route slightly more difficult than in previous years.

Three people have become anxious in the maze over its 15-year history, she said. One was a young boy who did not know he was afraid of enclosed spaces, while another was an older woman who knew about her fear but had been invited by friends. Sakk said visitors can always cut straight through the corn, and her phone number is on the map so she can help if needed.

The field contains animal-feed corn, which Sakk said tastes less sweet than sugar corn and has more of a grassy flavour. After the maze closes, the corn will be given to animals.