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Moonless Night, 2006


Untitled, 2009

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In all his periods and evolutions, Reich’s work delighted the eye. Whose eye? His own, to begin with. He told very little beyond the work. Occasional comment, critical or awed, about others, but not so much about himself.
What was on the paper or canvas came straight from Reich’s mind. He could see the line before he drew it, and he was contemptuous of people who couldn’t see things until they happened, people who lacked the expansive and continual creation of images, thoughts, poems, songs that was his life.
People who knew him admired his imagination, and they marveled at his freedom. Other people seem stunted and thwarted by comparison. Like Gertrude Stein, he gloried in gloire, and was crushed by rejection, but his constantly creative mind and wide-open outlook gave him amazing resilience. He stood up to bullies. Saved a dock rat from being burned alive by Oakland thugs. Stood up to police horses at a Vietnam War protest.

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