Don’s Life

1953-1956 Attends University of Manitoba School of Art. Studies with W.A. McCloy, Cecil Richards, Gis Eliasson, John Graham. Meets Mary Thorpe, fellow art student.

Studies painting and drawing with Robert A. Nelson and printmaking with Richard E. Williams.

Studies painting and lithography with R.A. Nelson and painting with George Swinton.

Graduates with B.F.A. with thesis Intuition: The Basis of Knowledge, the Stronghold of Art.

1957-1958 Studies painting with James Pinto at Instituto Allende, Mexico on a tuition scholarship. Solo Exhibition, El Patio Bar, San Miguel de Allende. Marries Mary Thorpe. Studies painting and drawing with Robert A. Nelson and printmaking with Richard E. Williams.

Solo exhibitions at Instituto Allende and University of Manitoba School of Art. Included in exhibition Canadian Painters in Mexico, Mexico City.

1959 Returns to Winnipeg, Manitoba to raise his family and try to continue developing his painting. First child Karl George born December 3.

1960 Solo Exhibition, Winnipeg Art Gallery.

1961 Daughter Lisa Ann born February 8.

1961-1962 Is artist-in-residence at the University of New Brunswick in Fredericton. The campus’s old observatory is his studio and he and Mary rent a small farmhouse for the year.

1962 Solo exhibition at Beaverbrook Gallery. Don returns to Winnipeg to mount Grant Gallery exhibition. This exhibition is seen by New York critic Clement Greenberg, who comments on it in artscanada, Vol.XX, No.2 (March/April, 1963), 98.

Of all the abstract artists whose work I came on in Winnipeg, Donald Reichert was the one who seemed to have the most possibilities. Almost everything I saw in a show of his at a commercial place, the Grant Gallery, was involved in the effort to say something. The main trouble was that it all went off in too many directions no one of which seemed exactly the right one for this artist. It will be interesting to see whether Reichert will be able to find the right one without leaving Winnipeg. Clement Greenberg

1962-1963 Awarded Canada Council Junior Grant to work in St. Ives, Cornwall. Don, Mary, Karl and Lisa live in Rose Cottage, where son John Jacob in born January 26. Don’s studio space is in a retired sea captain’s back garden. Photographs rocks, tidal pools, etc. along sea coast as he walks to his studio. Improvisational drawings, transfer paintings using paint made with white glue and some textured works using crack filler and mixed media on hard board. Exhibits works at Penwith Society, Sail-Loft Gallery and is included in four-person show at Fore Street Gallery, St. Ives. Meets artists Patrick Heron, Peter Lanyon, Alan Wood, Terry Frost, Alan Lowndes, Jeffrey Harris, John Reeve, Glen Lewis, Mickey Henry, Bernard and Janet Leach.

Does Altar series based on recognition of centrality of spirit in that place. Recognizes that he is “American” not European and that Jackson Pollock could not have come out of this relatively conservative spirit.

1963 Sees exhibition “British Painting in the Sixties” at the Whitechapel and Tate Galleries. At the exhibition he recognizes large scale is a device for getting attention in a highly competitive environment.

Decides to give up painting because “it didn’t seem to be a reasonable thing to be doing while trying to raise three kids.” Goes home for lunch and tells Mary. Returns to studio to clan up and pack it all away. “I had a brush sitting in paint and I thought I might as well get rid of it and Dark Painting came out of it. I was hooked by the process once again.”

Visits Tate Gallery and is moved by Japanese calligraphic work.

Returns to Winnipeg.

1964 Solo exhibition of calligraphic brush drawings, University of Manitoba School of Art. Attends Emma Lake Artists Workshop with Jules Olitsky and Stepan Volpe, Ken Lochhead and Mina Forsyth.

Begins teaching painting at School of Art, University of Manitoba.

1965 Attends Emma Lake Workshop with John Cage, Lawrence Alloway. Helps rescue John Cage who becomes lost while searching for wild mushrooms. Gives Cage his St. Ives denim jacket as a souvenir.

Solo exhibition, Yellow Door Gallery, Winnipeg.

Purchase Award, McLaren Acquisition Show, Winnipeg Art Gallery.

December 9 son Donald Ernest born in Winnipeg.

1967 Emma Lake Workshop with Frank Stella, Barbara Rose. Suggests Stella use piece of string to square up his paintings on crude stretcher made for him. This triggers Stella’s long series of Arc paintings.

Included in Visua ’67, Canadian Painting, Montreal.

Included in Western Painting ’67, traveling exhibition.

Reichert sets up first downtown studio, back section, third floor, 376 Donald Street.

1968 National Gallery Traveling Exhibition Don Reichert and George Wood.

Rents large studio floor with Bob Sakowsky, Ken Lochhead and George Swinton.

Don and Mary travel to New York, Madrid, Cuenca, Rome, Florence, Venice, Amsterdam and London to visit museums and galleries. Alone he drives to St. Ives. Begins Flowers for Mary and Alitalia series.

1969 Canada Council Senior Art Award. Begins Superimposition and Structure/Energy Blend series.

Solo Exhibition, Winnipeg Art Gallery and Gallery 1.1.1., University of Manitioba. Manitoba Centennial Exhibition. Sound track forms part of exhibition.

1970 Included in 150 Years of Art in Manitoba, Winnipeg Art Gallery, Manitoba Centennial Exhibition. Does large paintings combining wet sprinkled paint application with simple, geometric structural elements: August 1970 #1, August 1970 #2.

1971 Six Artists, Two Nations, exhibition at Moorhead State College, Minnesota with Judith Allsopp and Kenneth Lochhead from Winnipeg and Bryan M. Bradley, Jerry Rudquist and Karen Holmberg from Minneapolis-St. Paul, curated by Timothy Ray.

Continues geometric/organic work, with large untitled paintings. Reintroduces calligraphic brushwork to paintings.

On a visit to Winnipeg Clement Greenberg visits studio. “He said he was disappointed he hadn’t heard more about me. He thought I should have been out there competing. He liked “Big Attack” artists.”

1972 Speaker and panelist at UAAC Conference, Toronto.

Begins Soft paintings.

Paints Homage to Claude Monet.

Creates hand-made slides as visuals for performance of Façades by Sir William Walton and Dame Edith Sitwell at Eva Clare Hall, University of Manitoba School of Music.

Canada Council Art Bank purchases Passage III, 1968.

1973 Appointed Member of Royal Canadian Academy.

Acting Director, University of Manitoba School of Art.

Completes year-long painting project Space Garden, 7′ x 32′.

Third downtown studio–fifth floor, 374 Donald Street.

1973-1978 Member of Manitoba Department of Public Works Arts Advisory Committee.

1974 Paints Daybrake.Teaches painting, Banff Summer School.

Paints first large, unstretched outdoor canvases, Mountain Walks I, II, III based on trail hikes with painter Takao Tanabe.

Exhibits in Prairies 74, at Edmonton Art Gallery.

Exhibits in Western Canadian Painting, Bronfman Centre, Montreal.

1975 Winnipeg Centennial Exhibition, solo exhibition at Winnipeg Art Gallery, curated by William Kirby.

Mountain Walk I and II purchased by Winnipeg Art Gallery.

Sabbatical leave. Is Visiting Artist, Mount Allison University, Sackville, Nova Scotia. Work included in Canadian Canvas, Time/Life Traveling Exhibition.

Awarded Canada Council Senior Art Grant.

1976 Exhibits with Robert Archambeau, Thomas Gallery, Winnipeg. Exhibits paintings and sound work.

Work included in New Abstract Painting, Edmonton Art Gallery.

Work included in Spectrum Canada Exhibition, Montreal Olympics.

Work included in Mosaic, Province of Manitoba Exhibition, Montreal Olympics.

Canada Council Art Bank purchases Untitled I, II, and III, 1971, 1972.

Promoted to full professor.

1977 Recent Brush Drawings exhibition at Gallery 1.1.1., University of Manitoba.

Exhibits with Robert Archambeau, Atelier Ladywood.

Canada Council Art Bank purchases Starry Night, 1974 and Northern Flow #3, 1976.

1978 Awarded Manitoba Arts Council Project Grant.

First unstretched canvases worked outside in wilderness, Precambrian Shield.

As chairman of University of Manitoba’s Visiting Artists Committee brings in John Cage, Robert Irwin, Lucas Samaras and Robert Morris.

Receives French workman’s jacket from John Cage, to honor his receipt of the St. Ives jacket from Don at Emma Lake Workshop 1965.

1979 Builds backyard studio.

Paints out of doors in Precambrian Shield and in British Columbia, flying out of Vancouver with Toni Onley, “paints” Killer Whale Triptych, Harrison Lake B.C., July 9, 1979, Cabbage Island, B.C.

Exhibits with Robert Archambeau at The Melnychenko Gallery, Winnipeg.

Canada Council Art Bank purchases Rice Lake, July 1978, Near Packsack Mine and Near Gem Lake, June 1978.

Earns private pilot’s license. Taking aerial photographs and using as basis for paintings

1980 Does 140 2″ x 3″ drawings while watching film Apocalypse Now, in the seat of a downtown movie theatre.

Solo exhibition, Arthur Street Gallery, Winnipeg, curated by Jon Tupper. Exhibits unstretched canvases from Precambrian Shield with sound works.

RCA Exhibition, Manitoba Members at Winnipeg Art Gallery. Exhibits Lovers’ Island.

Canada Council Art Bank purchases Untitled (Precambrian Edge) 1978 and Painting–July 9, 1979, Cabbage Island, B.C.

1981 Receives Diploma of Merit from the Universita Delle Arti, Italy.

Paints large translucent hanging panels, acrylic on dacron. Co-publishes editions of lithographs with Moosehead Press, David Umholtz, Master Printer. Paints Baja Series of watercolours, Mexico.

Leads Painting Workshop, Mount Allison University, Sackville, Nova Scotia.

1982 Solo Exhibition, The Melnychenko Gallery.

Ken Hughs’s monograph on Don’s life and work. Also the CBC film Don Reichert, Artist in the Landscape with Robert Enright.

Nova Scotia and New Brunswick watercolour painting.

1983 Don Reichert Paintings from the Landscape, Winnipeg Art Gallery.

Gallery 1.1.1., University of Manitoba exhibition with Robert Archambeau.

Winnipeg Art Gallery purchases Lovers’ Island. Canada Council Art Bank purchases Trouble Near Gold Creek, 1982.

Arts Manitoba feature interview with Robert Enright, “Balancing the Instrument of Art.”

1984 Solo exhibition Figurative Works on Paper, The Melnychenko Gallery.

1985 On Border Crossings magazine Board of Directors.

Downtown studio, 160 Princess Street. Paints 6-part Giverny work. Begins Reflection Series. Canada Council Art Bank purchases Bissett 23-7-84.

1986 Solo exhibition Reflections, The Melnychenko Gallery.

1987 Exhibits Photo-paintings in 2-person show with son Karl’s sculpture and wall works.

“Still Transitional After All These Years, the Natural Art of Don Richert” cover article, Border Crossings, Vol. 6, No. 4.

Retires from teaching.

1988 Manitoba Arts Council Project Grant. Begins Watermusic Series.

Videon Artist Series Don Reichert.

Solo exhibition Resonances: Visual Dialogue in the Work of Don Reichert, Main Access Gallery.

Work included in, and guest speaker at Winnipeg Works on Paper, Art Gallery of Peterborough.

Guest speaker and panelist at Canadian Society of Landscape Architects national conference.

1989 Sound works played at Izmusic Concert, West End Cultural Centre.

Canada Council Art Bank purchases 3-12-87.

1989 Manitoba Arts Council Visual Arts Grant.

1990 Included in Mandalas and Other Images of Integration, Main/Access Gallery.

Professor Emeritus, University of Manitoba.

1991 Photographs Mayan ruins, Yucatan, Mexico, and begins Death Head series, Fuel for the Sun.

Speaker and panelist at symposium of Artists and the Environment, University of Manitoba.

Work in Update: Winnipeg Artists 1950s/1990, Winnipeg Art Gallery.

1992 Retrospective Solo Exhibition, Winnipeg Art Gallery, including Headcount.

Work included in Small Works By Big Artists, Gallery 1.1.1., University of Manitoba.

Work included in Marriage of Minds, Manitoba Printmakers Association.

Headcount, An Installation and Related Work, Art Gallery of Southwestern Manitoba, Brandon.

1993-1994 Work included in Achieving the Modern, a Winnipeg Art Gallery travelling exhibition.

1993 Deconstruction/construction of “special” cameras, from multi-holed pinhole to large format copy and landscape cameras. Continuing on exploration begun in 1986, imposes paint and “painting aesthetic” on photographic imagery.

1994 Work included in “Those Who Stayed”, Manitoba’s School of Art, 1960-1970, University of Manitoba.