EXHIBITION DATES  March 9 - April 18th, 2006


Jesse Reichek's sources for the 263 works in this series,
done between 1994 and 2000, were

Mortality/Immortality - Paradise  MYTHS

Myths of mortality/immortality reflect on the possibilities of life and the inevitability of death. Throughout human development, even for Neanderthals, the poetry and paintings of paradise are ever present. Paradise has been imagined as an orchard, a forest or a park. It has many names, such as Heaven, Nirvana, a Garden of Eden, the Elysian Fields, Valhalla, Shangri­­­‑la. For some it is a promised land, a place of personal perfection or a home for the righteous. In these wonderings and wanderings we can recognize the currents that connect mathematics, myth and madness.

Reichek painted a visual uni   verse for creation, mortality/immortality, and death that both follows in this heritage and offers new adventures. For Reichek, creation, mortality/immortality, and death constituted a continuum of existence

The paintings of Mortality/Immortality follow Creation and precede Death. While the paintings of Creation were vertical, the paintings of Mortality/Immortality are horizontal, as if paradise encompasses an endless horizon where location becomes the prerogative of each individual. In these paintings there is no up or down, east or west, vertical or horizontal.

In the Rabbinic musings, it is thought that some 26 creations might have preceded Genesis. Likewise, paradise is a partnership that is forever unfinished, tentative, and a journey that rejects a destination. The unknown and the uncertain are always accomplices of creation.

Reichek translated this into living. He often stated his morality was not to do good, in search of some heaven here or hereafter, but to try and do as little harm as possible. But he also embraced the belief that in life-as-painting, profound good luck was his partner in creation.

Before you is presented Reichek’s path of paradise. A visual encyclopedia mythica, without authorities or an index. New-found subtleties of hue and sudden unexpected pathways.

For Reichek the act of painting was his paradise.

Barry Weisberg
                                                                                                         Chicago, Illinois, Nov. 2005

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The following photographs of the exhibition were taken by Jonathan Reichek:

   

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JESSE REICHEK RETROSPECTIVE  --- PARTNERS IN CREATION

Works from 1947 to 2005

Creators Equity Foundation
2324 blake street • Berkeley, ca • 94704
PHONE:  (510) 514-8188  •  FAX: (510) 665-4893
email:  reichek@dslextreme.com

website address:   www.reichek.org