timBoucher » tim boucher : grow

tim boucher : grow

“You know this guy?” I nudged the guy next to me on the shoulder. I’d heard them talking.

“Well, I know the guy that represents him.”

“This is the best painting in the show,” I continued, pointing to the smaller piece in the upper right hand corner: an expressionist painting of soldiers beating up naked people. So simple, so stark, so accurate – I felt – to the spirit of the world at that moment.

The show had gotten me into that mood. As I walked through, I kept passing glimpses of symbolic images, snippets of phrases laced into artworks. Things I’d been thinking about, but things I’d just blindly assumed I was the only person focusing on. Seeing it all in one place, it seemed like we were telling a story, or that we were being told a story, and maybe trying somehow – however desperately – to participate in it.

“Oh that’s wonderful!” he said. “I’ll tell him. Are you an artist yourself?”

I almost didn’t answer yes. I usually like to be evasive in these kinds of situations. I didn’t want to appear that I’d been digging for some kind of recognition by making my comment. Just a joyous outburst I had to share after staggering zig-zaggedly around the place.

“Yeah I am…”

“Do you have a card?”

“No, I don’t think so,” I fumbled through my pockets. “Oh wait, yes I do,” I said and handed him one of my little seed packets I’d been making last year as give-aways. Most were about two and a half by two inches or so, made out of nice natural colored papers, folded, hand-cut and assembled to become seed packets. The seeds I’d got on eBay, wildflower seeds which were advertised to attract “song-birds, hummingbirds and butterflies.” On the fronts are stamped a nice-looking evergreen tree, and then hand-painted in two colors are a line across the top that says “tim boucher” and a line following that, “grow.” They fold in the back, and usually feature an animal foot-print stamp and an inspirational statement, saying or very short poem.

No contact info though.