Reinhard Reitzenstein

Reinhard Reitzenstein is an environmental sculptor. He creates works through which he investigates ways to unite and interconnect nature, culture, science, and technology. Born in Uelzen, Germany in 1949; he and his family immigrated to Canada in 1956. Reitzenstein went on to study at the Ontario College of Art in Toronto from 1968-1971.

From 1971 to 1991 he was represented by, the Carmen Lamanna Gallery, Toronto. Since 1993, is represented by the Olga Korper Gallery, Toronto. Reitzenstein works in several parallel areas: indoor installation and sculpture using cast, spun and welded metals, wood, glass, photography, digitally processed images; large scale drawings; outdoor tree-based installations and sound art. Much of his work centers around the tree as an archetype for the self and the symbiotic relationship humans share with the forests of the world. The tree serves as a marker of the ravages upon, and attempts at reconciliation with nature.

In 2017, for the Bonavista Biennale, he created a site-specific sculptural installation of an inverted tree piece, Waiting/Watching/Waiting that took an entire village of helpers in Newfoundland to make. The trees, carefully selected for their height and strength, stripped of their bark, and sealed with red ochre and linseed oil were inverted into deep holes that had been dug into a rocky causeway. Their roots were up top like antennae. In 2019, he created a complex tree installation which included large scale woodcut plates and prints at the Buffalo, New York Arts Studio.

He has held over 100 solo exhibitions and participated in over 300 group exhibitions throughout North and South America, as well as abroad. He has completed numerous public and private art commissions and is represented in over 50 public and corporate collections internationally, among them include: The National Gallery of Canada, the Art Gallery of Ontario, Memorial University of Newfoundland, Confederation Centre for the Arts, Lutz Teutloff Collection, Bielefeldt, Germany; Caracas, Venezuela; and the Burchfield Penney Art Center.

Reitzenstein has been an instructor in sculpture and interdisciplinary studies at the University of Guelph from 1980-1998, at Brock University 1991-94, Queens University 1997 and Toronto School of Art 1998-2000 and Sheridan College 2000. Furthermore, he has served as the Head of the Sculpture Program in the Department of Art at SUNY Buffalo.