Riley Wurster

“What is your favorite artwork?”

Curatorial Rationale

With my work, I want to bring light to issues that the environment is facing, as well as drive people to go out and spend time in nature, and make it a larger part of their lives. To do this, my work depicts the beauty of nature and then juxtaposes it with issues the environment and people face today, primarily pollution and consumerism which can be touted as a cause of it. As a result, walking away from this, I hope that the viewer considers their role in that, and what they can do to mitigate their or other’s damage to our planet. As a body of work, my vision is to have my message easily understood, alongside creating something that people are genuinely inspired by.

In my exhibition, there are two primary themes that I used to base my work on, which are consumerism and nature. Beginning with pieces on consumerism, I moved to nature-based pieces after thinking about the ill-effects of consumerism, and what those problems affect. Another reason behind the move to nature was just how much I was in it while creating my pieces on consumerism, and I wanted to create pieces based on the beauty I saw quite often. My ideas for consumerism came about as a result of a trip to the Crocker Art Museum, where I saw many other consumerist pieces, and became heavily inspired for quite a time. I explored several mediums and techniques to create my works, some of which were painting, clay, wire, photography, and drawing. In each of these pieces, I used an array of techniques and materials to create the work I wanted and the message I wanted to convey.

In displaying my work I wanted to create a juxtaposition between the nature and consumerism pieces, giving each a side of my exhibition. Between them, I have a door, which is meant to bridge the divide between each side, while still allowing the viewer to walk the line between them both figuratively and literally. By doing this, I am highlighting that juxtaposition, but also showing how important each is to people, and as a result how they connect. To help strengthen the connection between the viewer and the work, I created a flow between all of the pieces, as each one is connected in some way to one piece next to it. For example, all of the middle right pieces have some type of mountain or hills, anchored by the mountain valley which connects to Snowy Sierra Trees, as well as the Snowy Campsite. As a result, I intend for the audience to realize how connected everything is, and that there is always some form of causality that can be found way down the line of interactions, much akin to the butterfly effect. The viewer should understand that what they do matters, no matter how small the action, especially with the environment. They can harm the environment through a simple dropping of trash or a car ride, or they can enjoy it by just looking at a tree or even the sky. Humanity has become intertwined with nature, and my exhibition intends to show that.

Riley’s Art Work

  • Oscar

    Wire, Paper Mache, Trash, Plastic, Acrylic Paint

    40.64cm x 35.56cm x 62.23cm

    This piece was inspired by Constance Mallinson’s Cliffhanger and Sesame Street’s Oscar the Grouch. Cliffhanger uses a combination of muted and colorful pieces of trash to create a large mound, and I wanted to use that in my piece. I took the character of Oscar the Grouch who is always in the trash and turned him into the trash, using a combination of bright and bleak toys and pieces of trash to create his body.

  • Super Soda

    Acrylic on Canvas

    27.5 x 35.5cm

    Super Soda is heavily inspired by Wayne Thiebaud’s “Eight Lipsticks.” He emphasizes the subjects of his piece through the use of bright colors on them, and muted colors in the background. I took that into this piece with the gray and white leading the eye to the central soda, which has a burst of red and yellow, to draw the eye in further. The red and yellow are a call to colors heavily used in marketing, and the amount of sodas alludes to how similar and common marketing is.

  • Food

    Digital Photography (Olympus Pen EPL-10), Digital Art (Paint3D)

    11008px x 6424px

    This piece was based on puzzles I have previously done with my family, where it is a collage of different brands from the 60s or 70s. I wanted to create a similar collage with modern-day brands, specifically in fast food. So I utilized my camera and took pictures of most of the fast food locations near me, cropped them, and placed them in the collage. The piece shows the similarities and differences in marketing, as many use similar color schemes, or a recognizable character or logo.

  • Humanity's Nature

    Linoleum Ink Prints, Acrylic, on Paper

    October 2023

    46 x 30cm

    My goal for this project was to show the connection between consumerism and nature through Andy Warhol-inspired pop art. To accomplish this I used linoleum prints on a piece of paper with acrylic paint and created a diagonal pattern with the prints. The phone is meant to demonstrate how technology can connect us further with nature, and bring us closer to it, despite being the direct opposite.

  • Snowy Campsite

    Wood, Air Dry Clay, Acrylic Paint, Hot Glue

    November 2023

    32 x 23 x 14cm

    For this project, I gained inspiration from Christopher Reid’s Redwood Campsite, which gave me the idea of creating my own. However, I decided to create a miniature of a snowy campsite and decided to use air-dry clay and attach it to a piece of wood to give it an interesting base. I imagined that the campsite was on the side of a lake, on a sandbar, and built the forest around that idea. The campsite itself is just a simple tent and fire, and no one is there.

  • Rock Pile Canyon

    Colored Pencil on Paper

    30 x 23cm

    This piece is based on a picture I took of a place my family calls “The Rock Pile Canyon.” I spend a lot of time in nature, and this is one of my favorite places, as I annually sit in that spot on the opening mornings of hunting seasons. As my theme is nature, I figured it would be a great picture to adapt to colored pencils. Overall I just wanted to recreate the scene and push people to get out into nature.

  • Snowy Sierra Trees

    Photography, Olympus EPL-10 Mirrorless Camera

    Each Photo is 22 x 28 cm

    This piece was inspired by Ansel Adams’ work in general, but more specifically “Winter Sunrise, Sierra Nevada from Lone Pine,” as when I saw it, it gave me the idea to take my pictures in the Sierra Nevada near Alleghany, CA. I took many, but the series I chose highlight the beauty and the stillness of a snowy forest, and I hope that it will inspire more to get out and enjoy nature.

  • Pristine Mountain Valley

    Acrylic On Canvas

    50 x 40cm

    This piece was inspired by a section of the film The Ballad Of Buster Scruggs as well as various photos and paintings of Denali, specifically Ron Niebrugge’s photo The Mountain Known As Denali I wanted to capture an untouched mountain valley and feel that I have done so fairly well. I want my nature pieces to inspire more people to get out into nature and enjoy it, and hope this one can do that.

  • Otherwordly Earth

    Multi-Media on Paper:

    Charcoal, Oil Pastel, Graphite

    30.48cm x 45.72cm

    My artwork was meant to show the themes of nature and fantasy. I was inspired to make this piece not just from my inspirational piece, but also from my general love of nature, which is something I wanted to show in this piece. I did that by having it represent a clean slate. I got inspiration from The Oxbow, by Thomas Cole, which is a view from a mountain after a rainstorm. Large rain clouds are things I find very nice, so I wanted to make a piece where I could show them as Cole did.