Paul Seifert (1846-1921) has been described as an outsider artist living on the Wisconsin frontier. In the first-ever book on Seifert, illustrated with many of his paintings in color, Joe Kapler complicates the picture. With his flat lack of perspective and carefully detailed depictions of rural Wisconsin scenes, Seifert was a primitive artist yet not quite an “outsider” as usually defined. The son of a German school teacher and a member of the Wisconsin Archeological Society, Seifert was a pillar of his community in Richland County. Like his neighbors, Seifert farmed for a living. Painting was a hobby; he may have given some paintings away and bartered others for goods. He left behind a record of a particular place in time, “his imagery warm and nostalgic,” Kapler writes.
