Aaron Reichert

Aaron Reichert, born in Owosso, Michigan, and raised in Hartland, Michigan, is a portrait artist with a passion for capturing the essence of his subjects. He is Inspired by old photos, movies, TV, sport and political personalities, literary and artistic subjects. Reicherts black and white paintings capture the essence of his subject in grayscale that exude a captivating intensity. Utilizing a palette knife, he intuitively crafts dynamic portraits, shaping an environment of abstract energy that seems to pulsate beneath the skin of each subject. Aaron is an avid reader and his love of history fuels the many portraits of historical figures he paints. Artists born in the Midwest seem to have a special visual grasp of America. They have an innate inclination to develop ways to communicate images of America not just as scenery, but as a state of mind. From Thomas Hart Benton to Grant Wood to Georgia O'Keefe to Tom Wessleman, we find powerful imagery of America's scenes, passions, feelings and thoughts.

Born in the tiny town of Owosso, Michigan, the last day of 1978, Aaron was soon adopted by the Reicherts and raised in Hartland, Michigan. A talented artist from the age of twelve, Aaron made portraits of his personal heroes from history, stage, film and television. After graduating high school, he went to Chicago, where he received a BFA from Loyola University with emphasis on theatre and sculpture. He then studied theatrical arts at the School at Steppenwolf. For several years, art became his off-hours activity while he explored the world of acting, producing, and set construction.

After coming to New Orleans to work on film, painting soon became his full-time occupation. His subjects were always people — people found in quiet moments of solitude. From childhood, he had been fascinated by hazy, black and white Civil War photographs, particularly those of Abraham Lincoln, a figure of considerable loneness. Reichert’s faces and figures are hewn with pallet knife out of passages of black and white. Working without a detailed plan, he paints intuitively, shaping an environment of energy seemingly below the skin of the subject. From a distance, we see a dramatic figure; from close up, we confront a spontaneous orchestration of particles bursting from the canvas. Like many other notable portraitists — Van Gogh, Francis Bacon, Lucian Freud, and Richard Avedon — Reichert has created a technique that gets beneath the surface of his subjects and revitalizes the art form.

Reichert has had numerous gallery shows and juried exhibitions in New York, Miami, and New Orleans. (2010-2014). In 2012, he was in group shows at The Ogden Museum of Southern Art and the New Orleans Contemporary Arts Center. In 2013, he was given a solo show, “Women”, at the Meridian Museum of Art (2013). That same year he participated in SCOPE, NYC, and Art Basel, Switzerland, as part of SCOPE. His work has appeared in several art publications, including the cover article of Art Voices. He joined Angela King Gallery in 2015.

—M.Genet