FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Sacramento Artist Creates
Layers of Illusion

Fooling the Eye, Fooling the Mind:
Burnished Drawings by Don Reich
on view July 9 – September 11

June 20, 2005 – Sacramento, Calif. – The burnished drawings of Sacramento artist Don Reich exploit the power of illusion while prompting viewers to consider the seductively false reality depicted in photographs and other mass media images. The exhibit Fooling the Eye, Fooling the Mind, on view at the Crocker Art Museum July 9 – September 11, will examine a brief but important period in the artist’s career, the mid-1970s.

During this time, Reich integrated cut-out pictures into his compositions and reproduced the look of a collaged paper scrap so effectively that the cut edge and drawn line became indistinguishable. He invented his own techniques to achieve a polished commercial look; painstakingly copying cut-out images onto a lush watercolor background, then burnishing the multiple layers of drawing to create a shimmering effect. His works scramble visual elements, to shock viewers’ image-saturated minds. Unfortunately, Reich’s production of such works was fairly brief due to the onset of carpal-tunnel syndrome.

Reich was born to a working-class family in Martinez , California in 1931 and spent his teens on a small farm in Meadow Vista in Placer County. Largely self-taught, he enrolled in painting and drawing classes with Amelia Fischbacher and Wayne Thiebaud at Sacramento City College . He gained attention in the 1950s for his small, spare drawings, watercolors and collages. By the 1960s, Riech joined the stable of painters and ceramicists at Adeliza McHugh’s Candy Store Gallery in Folsom which included Robert Arneson, Roy DeForest, Maijia Peeples-Bright, Jim Nutt, Gladys Nilsson and David Gilhooly among others. Like these artists, Reich has never strayed far from representation. His facility with drawing — in pencil, brushstroke or pastel — seems to demand figuration. In his works executed since the 1970s, attention to detail, dream-like imagery and masterly use of color and line continue as recurrent themes.

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The Crocker Art Museum was founded in 1885 and continues as the leading art institution for the California Capital Region and Central Valley. The Museum offers a diverse spectrum of special exhibitions, events and programs to augment its collections of Californian, European and Asian artworks. The Crocker is located at 216 O Street in downtown Sacramento. Museum hours are 10 a.m. – 5 p.m., Tuesday – Sunday; Thursday until 9 p.m. For more information on exhibits and events call (916) 264-5423 or visit crockerartmuseum.org.

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Media Contact: LeAnne R. Ruzzamenti
Media: (916) 264-1963
Mobile : (916) 213-9402
Public: (916) 264-5423
216 O Street
Sacramento, CA 95814
www.crockerartmuseum.org