ART & POETRY BY PAUL & KATHY BOECHER©

This piece was done with watercolor pencil and watercolor paint at the Landing in Shakopee, MN on the Minnesota River. Paul participated in a reenactment of an 1800’s landscape artist from that time period. This place is covered with history. Being a river town, it soon began to fill up with buildings, stores, a school and church and homes for several who used the river for transporting their wares to other cities. Farmers, storekeepers, clergymen, families from various parts of the world came there to find their American dream. Today, this lovely addition to the Three Rivers Park System is a refuge from the big city life that churns and bustles nearby. Paul always considered himself an 1800s kind of guy. He loved the history of that time period and the persistence of the people to make a living just to stay alive. He would don his costume and spend a weekend with other reenactors, portraying life during that time in history. The painting was done as a testimony to one of the buildings in the park. The simplicity of lines, color, light and movement are a contrast to the lives of people today, They worked very hard to make a living. From dusk to dawn, time would be spent in the fields, milking cows, building houses, forging horseshoes, preparing a sermon or going to school for the young’un’s. I imagine life today would be completely foreign to what happened then, but someone had the foresight to preserve these communities so that we could view history in the making.

An explosion of color pours through the negative spaces,

A new edifice, designed to add to the glory of the old,

Images of stained glass shards,

Intermingled with spatters of light,

Entwined with the movement of a paintbrush,

Morning displays its majesty,

Through the glistening light,

Enhanced by trembling shadows,

Dotted with motion, love and precision,

The brush dances across the canvas,

Colors blend,

The artist works diligently,

To create his art,

God takes it many steps beyond.