Giant snow sculptures by international artists on display in Colorado
Steve Nguyen works on fine details inside the snow sculpture of the Barney L. Ford house museum, in celebration of the 200th anniversary of Barney Ford’s birth, during the 31st annual International Snow Sculpture Championships in Breckenridge, Colo., on Thursday, Jan. 27, 2022. This year, nine teams from around the world are crafting 12-foot, 25-ton blocks of solid snow into intricate sculptures. Viewing begins on Friday, Jan. 28 and runs through Feb. 2, 2022. (Chancey Bush /The Gazette)
Chancey Bush/ The Gazette
The International Snow Sculpture Championships start with high-quality snow (supplied by Breckenridge Ski Resort) and transformed into huge blocks by Town of Breckenridge staff and volunteers.
In Breckenridge, 12-foot, 25-ton blocks of solid snow have been transformed into intricate works of art. Now they demand to be seen.
Starting Friday and lasting through Wednesday, it’s viewing week for the International Snow Sculpture Championships, following a week of crafting by teams from around the world.
Through the cold of night, they chipped and carved away for a coveted title that has gone unclaimed the past two years, when the event was canceled due to the pandemic. Admirers, too, missed the tradition spanning three decades.
So it will be a sweet return to Riverwalk Center. While the sculptures will be on display all day, the biggest draw is the Grand Illumination that happens from 4:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. each day through Wednesday.
The show of “art, engineering and ingenuity is truly something to behold,” writes Breckenridge Tourism Office CEO Lucy Kay in a guide to this year’s event.
Team Captain Keith Martin, of Team Breckenridge, works on details on the wings of the snow sculpture titled “The Boy Who Believed He Could Fly” during the 31st annual International Snow Sculpture Championships in Breckenridge, Colo., on Thursday, Jan. 27, 2022. This year, nine teams from around the world are crafting 12-foot, 25-ton blocks of solid snow into intricate sculptures. Viewing begins on Friday, Jan. 28 and runs through Feb. 2, 2022. (Chancey Bush /The Gazette)
From the organizing committee’s 250 invites, nine teams returned plans worthy of selection. The teams hail from Ecuador, Mexico, Germany, New York, Wisconsin and Colorado.
As depicted in the festival guide, their plans included abstract works of geometry, a human hand touching a robot’s, a resurrecting woolly mammoth, a bear playing a piano, a bee pollinating a flower, a crowned boy sitting on a toilet and another boy with wings.
This is the kind of creativity that has come from the event, which founder Rob Neyland traces to 1980.
Rick Seeley and Emily Krawczuk, with Team Colorado, work on sculpting details on their “Fallen Angel” snow sculpture during the 31st annual International Snow Sculpture Championships in Breckenridge, Colo., on Thursday, Jan. 27, 2022. This year, nine teams from around the world are crafting 12-foot, 25-ton blocks of solid snow into intricate sculptures. Viewing begins on Friday, Jan. 28 and runs through Feb. 2, 2022. (Chancey Bush /The Gazette)
“This whole thing came from a coin toss from Ullr Fest,” he recalls in the guide, referring to another long tradition in Breckenridge. “We flipped a coin to decide if we’d do a snow sculpture, which we’d never done before, or do a float for the Ullr Parade.”
Heads it was, sculpture it was. That turned into an annual competition that Neyland and his team regularly won. He remembers someone in 1985 recommending they compete in nationals.
“And we said, ‘Holy crap, there are nationals?’ That, then and there, was when we were set on the course of: We need to elevate this art form for Breckenridge to make Breckenridge become known for this art form.”
Viewing is free this week. For more information, visit gobreck.com/event/international-snow-sculpture-championships
