Editor’s note: This story was originally published Sept. 19, 2024. All references to the 2026 Common Ground Country Fair have been updated.
A few months after each year’s Common Ground Country Fair wraps up in late September, the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association unveils one of the most beloved parts of the following year’s fair: the poster.
Posters from 1976-1980 are unavailable.
Perhaps one of the most well-known aspects of the fair, the yearly poster has become a collector’s item for attendees, with more than 40 individual works of art featured over the years. The yearly unveiling of the poster is highly anticipated, with fairgoers waiting patiently to buy a poster, tote bag or T-shirt featuring the design
The poster always features an original work of art with some element of the agricultural or natural world in Maine. Some years feature farm animals, like gentle cows, curious pigs, mischievous goats, serene sheep and perennial poster favorite chicken, with their often colorful personalities.
Sometimes, it’s the bounty of the fields, from elegant rainbow chard to spindly garlic scapes to bright orange carrots. And other times it’s a nature scene, such as a crow eating berries, a monarch butterfly snacking on milkweed or, in this year’s poster, a border collie framed by cheerful sunflowers.
Regardless of the subject matter, each piece of art ennobles and uplifts the things that make rural living in Maine so special — which is what the fair itself is all about.
Each year, MOFGA hosts a contest to find the next poster design. The 2026 poster competition may be closed, but head over to the organization’s site for the opportunity to enter the competition to design the 2027 poster.
This year’s fair — the 50th anniversary — will be held Sept. 25, 26, and 27 at the organization’s headquarters in Unity.