Everyday Art

Professor turns normal objects into expressive works of art

By Danielle MacMurchy

Worn-out shoes, tattered wood, rusty shovels and an antique lawn mower are not elements typically associated with art. Yet Fresno State Art Professor Raphael Reichert uses these mundane objects to create expressive sculptures. These vintage materials turned brilliant will be featured in Dust Works, an art exhibit in the Conley Art Gallery, now through March 28.

As far as the material chosen for Reichert’s works, he said he creates his art out of anything. Some of the material used relates to Reichert in some way or another. Several of his sculptures include various pieces of railroad tracks. This, he says, refers to his childhood memory of walking the tracks.

While the artist pours his experience and perspective into his art, the viewer also comes with a perspective. “Everyone brings their own baggage to every experience,” Reichert said. “To some a work of art may be ineffective; while to others it could give them a whole new way of looking at the world.”

Fresno State senior Christopher Lessley identified with the masculinity and the humor of Reichert’s art. “His art work is humorous and direct, and very manly,” Lessley said.

Lessley noted how almost every sculpture was formed from heavy objects. Reichert said that he did not necessarily intend for the exhibit to have a masculine feel. “It’s an offshoot of me wanting to make things to last,” he said. “In the exhibit, things are real durable and nothing is real soft.”

As a person walks through the gallery, even the background music is heavy. The music heard is by Philip Glass from the film The Hours. “Music is a very important part of the show,” Reichert said. “I designed [the music and the art] together.”

Reichert said he hopes his show will express a sense of time.

“ I’ve seen a lot of things come and go here,” said Reichert, who began teaching at Fresno State in 1971. “I’ve seen the effects of time.”

Reichert said he hopes viewers of his art will walk away with a sense of the influence time has on things and people. His sculpture, “When I was your Age,” does just that. The project began when a friend of Reichert brought him a rusty, old lawn mower he had found. As Reichert was rebuilding the lawn mower, he began thinking about how, “every age has its own ‘generational myth’ about how rough we had it,” Reichert said. The sculpture illustrates the mower slicing through a lawn of rocks and steel grass. Anyone with a grandparent can relate to, “When I was your Age.”

Some students may be drawn to Reichert’s work “Cold Sweat in 101.” The piece is made up of four, 5-foot tall stacks of picture slides. “Art History students would know exactly what I was talking about,” Reichert said. “This piece is dedicated to the over 7,000 students who sat in my art history courses and weathered the seemingly infinite array of image and fact.”

Reichert has also taught at the University of Wyoming, the University of British Columbia and the University of Victoria. After 33 years and more than 7,000 students, Reichert said he plans to retire at the end of this semester, but would still like to teach every other semester and continue to produce his unique sculptures.