Michael Blaser is the official 2006 Tall Stacks artist.  Born in Davenport, Iowa, Michael Blaser spent his childhood days along the Mississippi River fishing and watching the diesel towboats push their loads.  He would try to imagine himself on the deck of a towboat awaiting some great adventure.  When he wasn’t planning his next adventure on the river, he found enjoyment through painting oils of the great American steamers, frigates and clipper ships.  He says he painted them because he loved the ships and their escape themes.

By the early 1980s, Michael Blaser had emerged as a fine artist painting both historic and contemporary scenes of the Mississippi, Ohio, and Missouri Rivers and the Great Lakes.  He primarily works in oil and his themes deal with historic cities and shipping familiar to the city at a given time.  He writes, “I’ve found through trial and error, that although people love the connection to boats and ships, they truly get excited when there is an interrelationship between that particular vessel and their home town.”  Blaser gathers information by visiting a community, photographing it, and researching it’s history by visiting museums and talking to historians and people who work the riverfronts.  He has painted river cities such as St. Louis, Memphis, Cincinnati, and Pittsburgh among others.