The Boyer Gallery, officially known as the Paul Boyer Museum of Animated Carvings and commonly called "The Boyer Museum", is a

folk art Folk art covers all forms of visual art made in the context of folk culture. Definitions vary, but generally the objects have practical utility of some kind, rather than being exclusively decorative art, decorative. The makers of folk art a ...

museum located at 1205 M Street in

Belleville, Kansas Belleville is a city in and the county seat of Republic County, Kansas, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population of the city was 2,007. History Belleville was founded in 1869, and incorporated as a city in 1878. It was named for A ...

, United States. It features the animated

sculpture Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...

s of Paul Boyer. Many of the displays are hand carved

wood Wood is a porous and fibrous structural tissue found in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulose fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin th ...

en pieces that have been animated with hand-built

motor An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy. Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power gen ...

s and mechanics, while others are working models of

aircraft An aircraft is a vehicle that is able to fly by gaining support from the air. It counters the force of gravity by using either static lift or by using the dynamic lift of an airfoil, or in a few cases the downward thrust from jet engines ...

tractor A tractor is an engineering vehicle specifically designed to deliver a high tractive effort (or torque) at slow speeds, for the purposes of hauling a trailer or machinery such as that used in agriculture, mining or construction. Most common ...

engine An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy. Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power gen ...

s. All of the pieces were built from scratch. The gallery was closed for several years, but was reopened in 2007 by Boyer's daughters.

External links

Paul Boyer Museum of Animated Carvings
- information about the museum
SPACES: Paul Boyer, Boyer Museum of Animated CarvingsRoadside America listing
Biographical museums in Kansas Museums in Republic County, Kansas Folk art museums and galleries in Kansas {{Kansas-museum-stub