Moritz "R" was born as Moritz Reichelt in 1955 in Halle/Saale, East-Germany, but grew up in Celle, West-Germany.
He debuts in the world of art in 1968, when he is 12 years old. The first ever public showing of one of his works happens to take place on the "Documenta IV". The reknown international art show in Kassel selects his painting of a steam-locomotive for the children's painting section.
In 1972 he gets his first exhibition in his former school, where he has been kicked out only 2 years earlier for rebellious and antiauthoritarian behaviours. The family moves to Munich, where Moritz visits an art-school for two years. He returns to Duesseldorf in 1977 just in time to encounter a new cultural phenomenon: punk. For more than a year he and two friends run a Punk/New Wave art gallery in Wuppertal, a suburb of Duesseldorf. The "Galerie Art Attack" becomes a melting point for a new art scene, where painters, musicians and multi-media artists mix the cultural cocktail for the next decade.
In those days Moritz Reichelt starts his musical ambitions: Out of a few minor music projects
the band Der Plan evolves in 1979 and gains international reputation within the next years. Although painting is Moritz R's first and foremost profession, he would be known worldwide for the band. What followed were creative years of acting out both the life of a painter and the life of a musician. After the foundation of the independent label Ata Tak in Duesseldorf in 1980, producing music and designing record covers becomes another field of activity for him. A long-term collaboration between him and German pop musician Andreas Dorau starts, when Dorau's song "Fred vom Jupiter" becomes a top ten charts hit in Germany.
Besides painting, making music and designing record covers, Moritz R did set designs for several films and TV productions. For more than 6 years he is doing illustrations for the German magazine "Tempo" under the pseudonym of Marie-Claire de St.Rocaille.
In 1984 Moritz Reichelt moves to Hamburg, the harbour-town in Northern Germany. Although he stays there for 10 years all that remains left is an unappeasable desire for a warm climate in sunny Southern regions. Consequently he moves to Munich, Bavaria, the most Southern big German city. In 1993 after the temporary end of Der Plan Moritz Reichelt writes his first book, a history of the band and the punk years in Duesseldorf. In 1998 the second book, "Popkatalog", is published, featuring 235 images of his best artworks. The books can be ordered in the bookshop of this museum.
Since 1992 Moritz R has become a pioneer in yet another field of pop culture, the exotic art of "Tiki". He was the first painter of this international revival of an American life-style of the 50s. One highlight of this phase of his is the decoration of the Tabou Tiki Room cocktail bar in Berlin. At the end of the year 2002 Moritz R takes the opportunity and moves to Germany's new developing capital, where he is living happily since. After 11 years in oblivion he reforms his old band Der Plan and plays on several international music festivals. In 2006 his son Franz is born.
Since 2006 Moritz Reichelt works as programmer and architect in "Second Life", designing the virtual platform of Universal Records. From the view angle that only future allows his entire work must be seen as an anticipation of the Virtual Worlds. And will probably not end here.