Artist Reifke presents 300-piece design show at Brandstater Gallery

The show titled “Don’t Stop” featured more than 300 pieces created for such companies as Patagonia, Sector 9 Skateboards, Mountain Hardware, San Diego Zoo, Outdoor Research, Camelbak and many others, and includes examples of sketches showing Reifke’s process in illustrating and designing product labels, skateboards, t-shirts, toys, film, and other elements.

The exhibit was on display Jan. 16 through Feb. 8 at La Sierra University’s Brandstater Gallery in the Visual Art Center complex. An artist’s reception held on  Feb. 4 attraced more than 130 attendees in spite of extreme weather forecasts. All attendees of the reception received free stickers designed by Reifke through his business, Salty Timbers.

“Looking at Reifke’s art and designs reminded me of why I am an artist,” said gallery director and assistant art professor Tim Musso in an exhibition statement. “The strong graphic line-work, sophisticated compositions, variety of images, and beautiful color palettes all combined to make memorable images.” He noted that the show is the most complicated he has installed in the past several years and is unique in that it is comprised of hundreds of designs by a single graphic designer.

Reifke connected with Musso via a mutual friend who is also an artist and printmaker. Reifke got his start in the art and design world while studying at the University of California, San Diego from which he earned two bachelor’s degrees in communications and visual arts in 2000.

“Looking at Reifke’s art and designs reminded me of why I am an artist.” - Brandstater Gallery Director Tim Musso, assistant art professor

In 2010, Reifke established his own multidisciplinary design company, Salty Timbers based in Pollock Pines, California, offering illustration and design to the action sports and outdoor markets, among others. He also developed his own line of t-shirts, hats, skateboard designs, stickers, and other items.

Reifke spends about 20-30 hours a week making art and another 30-40 “researching, brainstorming, planning, prepping, sketching and communicating about all my projects,” he said. He uses “good old fashioned pen and paper” in the design and illustration process, he said, as well as watercolor. Most of his work is screen printed so he aims for illustrations that allow for clean prints. Lately he has added digital technology toward speeding project completion.

He found his way into the design industry through happenstance and networking, focused effort and self-instruction. For approximately 12 years before establishing Salty Timbers he pursued graphic design in the skateboard and surf industry designing decks for Sector 9 Skateboards and designs for outdoor startup, Mission Playground.

His interests in vibrant skateboard design sparked during the 1980s when he visited board shops as a kid. “I was immediate­ly and irrevocably impacted by an array of art that unapologetically smacked the viewer in the face,” Reifke writes in his artist’s statement. “Skateboarding was the flash point, and it opened my eyes to the fact that these opportunities to make usable art were everywhere I looked. I was always drawing, always doodling, and never satisfied.”