Portals are an Open Door to the Trolls in DL

This whimsical public art exhibit in Detroit Lakes encourages all ages to experience an outdoor adventure with childlike enthusiasm.

WRITTEN AND PHOTOGRAPHED BY CHRIS MARCOTTE

Three boys scampered down the trail and around the corner while I stood taking in the view. Up early, I saw no other vehicles, although I met two people on bicycles, and we talked for a few minutes. Everyone, it seemed, had something to say about the trolls. The blue sky and bright sun made me glad I had worn a hat on my quest to find Barefoot Frida. She is one of the nine larger-than-life statues “hidden” around the Detroit Lakes (DL) area and known collectively as the Trolls in DL.

“I found it,” hollered one of the boys. By the time I reached Frida, the boys’ parents had caught up. Melissa and Garrett Chisholm, and their sons Chase, Mason, and Payton were from Ada, Minnesota, and this was their third statue. Like many of the people on the troll adventure, they planned to locate all nine by the end of the day. I had started the previous afternoon, so after Frida, the only one I had left to find was the Golden Rabbit.

No matter how old you are, you can’t help but smile when you see the whimsical trolls. Participants are encouraged to start at the Detroit Lakes City Park where Alexa, the first troll, is easy to spot because she is thirty feet tall. From the parking area, follow the clusters of birdhouses in the trees or look for a gathering of other troll hunters. The large wooden storybook in front of Alexa explains that she came to town to prepare an elixir that she hopes will cure those who have been cursed by the menacing Golden Rabbit. Thomas Dambo, the creator of the trolls and their counterparts wrote the story specifically for the Detroit Lakes community.

Alexa needs special ingredients for her elixir. The riddles in the story lead to the various ingredients, each represented by one of the four other tremendously tall trolls: Barefoot Frida, Ronny Funny Face, Jacob Everear, and Long Leif (pronounced “life”). Another ingredient Alexa needs is the songs of birds. Dambo explains that she pushes her arm through a mirror (a magical portal in Dambo’s troll world). The other end of Alexa’s arm can be seen reaching through three identical mirrors throughout the area: at the Historic Holmes Theater in Detroit Lakes, the City Hall in Perham, and Robert’s Alley in Fargo. She’s reaching for the birdhouses, representative of the birdsongs.

Providing Alexa with the ingredients and gathering clues from the other trolls will then lead you to the ninth statue, the Golden Rabbit.

The trolls and the Golden Rabbit are hidden in wooded areas within a fifteen-mile radius around Alexa. Participants can scan a QR code on a sign near each of the trolls, which provides clues to the other trolls and portals. Most statues are located within one third of a mile from where you park. The paths are wide and well marked, and parents with sturdy strollers can maneuver easily. Two of the paths are paved and wheelchair accessible. Clusters of purple, blue, and yellow birdhouses (eight hundred in all) are in and around the statues. Thanks to generous funding partners, there is no admission fee.

This morning, Stokman pours the starter into a bowl and empties the excess into two other containers: In one, he puts 20 grams for the next loaf. The extra is set aside for other purposes, he says. “A few times a week, I’ll make a batch of pancakes, or a skillet using ground beef, peppers, and mushrooms with the discarded batter poured on top, then baked. Both are family favorites.”

As I sip my coffee, I watch him move about the kitchen with a precision that makes it easy to imagine him in his operating room. He measures his ingredients in grams using a scale, rather than cups and ounces. According to Stokman, it’s more accurate and makes less mess. The scale, bowl, spatula, thermometer, and water bottle are his only tools. Stokman explains that he bakes the bread on the days he is in the operating room and makes dough on days he meets patients in clinic, since his start time on clinic days is a bit later.

He puts the ingredients into a bowl, then mixes. Next, he pushes salt into the dough, using 25 grams, a bit more than most recipes call for. The dough appears stringy at first, but after about five minutes, it begins to unify, and I see it take shape. He sets the dough on a piece of parchment in a cast iron Dutch oven and covers it with a waffle-weaved towel for the unique texture left behind. Using the oven light as the only source of heat, the dough rests inside for several hours and is pulled and stretched every thirty minutes or so by Stephanie. It’s then moved into a standard mixing bowl and folded once again into the towel to be refrigerated overnight. When ready for baking the next morning, Stokman sprinkles the dough with flour and uses a safety razor to score the dough in a pattern uniquely his own.

Long Leif (pronounced “life”), at thirty-six feet, is the tallest troll that artist Thomas Dambo has built. As of June 2024, Dambo has created 138 giant sculptures from recycled materials in seventeen countries across the world.

Trolls in DL is presented by Project 412, whose mission is to connect and elevate the cultural and economic vibrancy of the Lakes Area. “The goals of the troll hunt are to get out in nature, build community, and think better about recycling and caring for our world. As you walk the trails, we hope you have fun exploring our beautiful region and take away a message that we all can do better to care for our earth,” explains Amy Stoller Stearns, executive director of Project 412. It was clear these goals are being met as I interacted with multi-generational families from the area, as well as from Duluth, the Twin Cities, North Dakota, and Canada. Casual conversations at the beginning of trails, words of encouragement along the way, and claps on the back when you meet others on their journey are plentiful and appreciated.

Making the Trolls

“The Trolls in DL project started small with just a couple trolls, but as ideas were generated and sponsors were secured, it quickly became five trolls, a golden rabbit, and three portals,” Stearns says.

Danish recycle artist Thomas Dambo, creator of the trolls, has incorporated his love of his heritage with his desire to make use of trash. The result is a creative art form that invites people to have some fun outdoors while inspiring them to cherish the world around them. Over the last decade Dambo has built 138 giant sculptures from recycled materials in seventeen countries across the world. The Detroit Lakes project is his largest installation in the United States.

Each of the trolls requires about a thousand hours to design, plan, and build. Dambo first visited Detroit Lakes in May of 2023 to scout good “troll sites” with Project 412 staff. “We were impressed with Thomas from our first interaction. He is delightful, imaginative, and a visionary,” Stearns says. “At the Becker County Waste site, Thomas spotted the discarded yellow crates from Bismarck Tool and Die Manufacturing. When he learned the containers could not easily be recycled, he decided to incorporate them into the story by creating the Golden Rabbit.”

The location of the Golden Rabbit is somewhat secret, though the clues provided by each of the five trolls and three portals will lead to where you can find it.

After the story was written, the expressive faces, hands, and feet were created at Dambo’s Copenhagen studio and shipped to Minnesota. During four extremely well-organized and productive weeks in May and June this year, Dambo, his crew of fifteen international artists, and hundreds of volunteers got to work. They built the trolls, portals, and birdhouses from salvaged wood from the Highway 34 expansion project between Osage and Park Rapids. Wood is Dambo’s favorite material to work with because it is fully biodegradable.

Volunteers played an integral role in completing the project on time. During the construction phase, over two hundred volunteers from the area, as well as a handful from as far away as Texas and Georgia, worked hands-on at building sites, donating nearly two thousand hours. Another hundred volunteers prepared homemade meals and snacks. One of their most unusual tasks was to not divulge where any of the trolls were being built. Sara Bekkerus was ready to volunteer the minute she heard about the project. She had a chance to work on three of the trolls and did her share of painting birdhouses. “Personally, this project meant a lot to me,” she says. “I agree with the philosophy that we need to be protectors of the earth, and two of the trolls are located on land my family used to own.”

Despite the rainy days and the mosquitoes, Dambo was extremely pleased with the exhibit and impressed with the Detroit Lakes area community. “It is the best exhibition I have ever done, and nothing will compare to this,” he says.

Project 412 had a tremendous vision, and Detroit Lakes will share the benefits of Trolls in DL for years to come. “It was an incredible experience to work with Dambo’s crew, and I’m even more delighted about the community of volunteers we built and the joy that this art exhibition is bringing to so many people!” Stearns says.

My own two-day experience was filled with smiles and kind words. I look forward to sharing Trolls in DL with my seven-year-old grandson soon.

Jacob Everear stretches out in the Wannigan Regional Park in Frazee. He is one of two trolls that can be climbed. Once you are seated in his hand, you are encouraged to tell him a story about someone dear to you.

Finding the Trolls

There are three ways to find them:

Play the troll game: Start your troll adventure in the Detroit Lakes City Park, 1355 Washington Ave., Detroit Lakes. Visit during daylight hours. Alexa stands in the Detroit Lakes City Park and is viewable from the parking lot. Read the big storybook and follow the steps to solve each riddle.
See the trolls without playing the troll game by visiting trollsdl.com.
Discover the trolls via geocaching at geocaching.com/trollsdl.

To prepare for your troll hunt, put on your hiking shoes and bug repellant. If you post pictures of the trolls on social media, keep the location secret so others may have fun discovering them.

More Information

Project 412 — project12mn.org

Trolls in DL — trollsDL.com

Thomas Dambo — thomasdambo.com and trollmap.com