Easy Rieder

There was something so quintessentially Australian sitting in Mike Rieder’s kitchen, in Abu Tor, in Jerusalem. It’s so roomy and breezy and there’s just something about the anarchistic banter bouncing off the walls.
But it’s not like you’d go and stick your thonged feet on the table. For all the mandate period, moyen-oriental charm of the apartment the place is decked out modernly. And Mike is half yekke.
We supped and sipped our beers and shared our experiences as the sons of immigrants to Australia, Mike’s laconic form draped over a chair, cigarette in hand. I like eating artists’ cooking. No matter how simple there’s almost always some special zing to the flavour. Mike fondly showed me the views from the balcony and the kitchen. Mike has the apartment all to himself sitting on the crossroads of Abu Tor, the Sherover Promenade, the Church of Evil Counsel, Derech Hevron and the former Jerusalem railway station. Out on the balcony a stiff breeze nearly blows our hair away. It’s that famous Jerusalem night air, this town’s version of the Fremantle doctor. It's so stiff it could have blown a B52 away.
Mike’s workshop is in one of the rooms in the apartment. There are neighbours in the apartment underneath him and that has an influence on the type of sculptures he’s producing now. They’re relatively light, even though he’s working mainly in steel these days. They’re abstract, steel frames as often as not swathed in steel meshing. Mike says he likes the dual and contrasting aspects of the transparency of the mesh and of form defined by the swaddling. I'm probably reframing and those are not his words, not exactly. But I agree.
In the past Mike’s work as a sculptor was mainly in wood and bronze. But he ran a metalwork business in Melbourne for 17 years too, doing architectural metalwork and small structural work. One of his theories about his present choice of working material is that now that he isn’t doing production work in metal anymore he can sculpt with steel. He smiles bashfully. Lavishing your creative imagination on the stuff you’re running a business around, just seems too contradictory.
In the mid 1970's Michael studied Ceramic Design at Caulfield Institute of Technology in Melbourne, and worked as an apprentice to Danish potter Vagn Nykel. His introduction to steel and wood began when he was enrolled in a Sculpture course at Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology in the late 1970's. In Australia Mike worked in pottery, sculpting and fabricating in stainless steel designing and producing kitchen range hoods, furniture, and balustrades. Since leaving Australia for Israel, Mike decided to concentrate on his art.
It’s an unusual decision. Most of us succumb in the end to the dictates of harsh Middle Eastern reality and go into business of one sort or another. This is the Middle East and there is no fair go, not unless you get out and rustle it up for yourself. But Mike has his own agenda, nonconformist even in a cauldron of conservatism like Jerusalem, eking out his independent lifestyle in the capital’s inverted cosmopolitan bubble. Maybe art isn’t a business but artists want tangible recognition for their efforts too. So Israel isn’t Mike’s only potential market; Mike has an eye on Europe, visiting there from time to time. He has already exhibited in London and sold works in a London gallery. You can have a peek at Mike’s style on his site,http://www.michaelrieder.com/.It lies somewhere on the turf, beyond the tall poppy syndrome but within the bounds of decency.