William Struby: Pink + Red

Author: Cierra Linander (OVAC Intern)

William Struby, Pink + Red, Acrylic, paper, modeling paste,
and plastic, 10x7.25x3/4" 2012

Concept/OK exhibition artist William Struby lives in Oklahoma City and works primarily with mixed media, including photomontage, computer-treatment, and collage techniques. By combining two or more components, Struby melds images into dialogue form, which generates a story within the audience.

Using mixed media, Struby actuates the messy, rich, and impure qualities to life within his works. He considers his successful pieces those that become “an entity apart from its components.”  For Struby’s Concept/OK piece, he hopes the mystery of the work invokes individual interpretation from the audience.

William Struby, Pink + Red [alternate view], Acrylic, paper, modeling paste, 
and plastic, 10x7.25x3/4" 2012

The piece itself is a two-sided mobile. The mobile is comprised of paper, acrylic, modeling paste and plastic on 3/4” packing material with wire and “swivels”.

Named after the dominant colors in the piece, Pink + Red required minimal premeditation and was created as the result of instinctual, Jungian creation. Struby explains that with works like Pink +Red, recognizable influences may reside within the work (even if they are not planned images) taken from concepts like Zen Buddhism, which are noticeable after its completion.

One of Struby’s goals as an artist is to “explore the connections and space between the conscious and unconscious.” His works evoke mystery in their significance and he hopes his viewers find meaning to his pieces through their own curiosity. 

The Concept/OK: Art in Oklahoma exhibition opens December 16, 1-5 pm at the new Tulsa Arts and Humanities Council’s Hardesty Arts Center. See www.concept-ok.org for more information.