Close-up of a young man with short brown hair, light skin, a beard, and wearing a dark shirt, looking directly at the camera with a neutral expression.
Colorful indoor rock climbing wall with six holds of various colors mounted on a wooden climbing board.
An art display featuring a large wooden sculpture shaped like the state of California, with a small wooden cutout of California attached to it. The sculpture has cutouts in geometric shapes and is set in an art gallery with paintings and a sign in the background.

Robert Rusch

Hunt Residencies III 20

My name is Robert Rusch. I am an artist working in Buffalo, New York. I received my BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2016. I am part of the first cohort of artists of the Buffalo Institute for Contemporary Art School (BICA School) - Buffalo's first and only alternative model of secondary art education.

My art making is a multidisciplinary process with sculpture, print media, and drawing at its core. Works are made as reactions to forms, or forms inviting reaction; compositional skeletons become a creative playground that invites the viewer to uncover varying interpretations through ideological points of access. A curious exploration of materials and a graphic sensibility unifies the work, which aims to embed one's personal narrative into material process and craft. Inspiration is drawn from many sources in everyday life: the absurdity in day-to-day routines, class-aspirational furniture, analog tools, olympic-style weightlifting, cooking, slapstick humor, as well as from art history.

Abstract artwork featuring vertical orange, green, and teal stripes with geometric shapes and cutouts, including a blue background within a rectangular frame.
A purple cube sculpture with abstract face drawings on it, topped with wooden candle-like objects, displayed on a white pedestal near large glass windows showing a city street outside.