William Lobdell is a Kansas City-based sculptor and painter known for his innovative mixed-media cityscapes that blend painting, sculpture, and everyday detritus into compelling works of urban narrative. William attended the Kansas City Art Institute in 1988, and began sculpting professionally in 1990. Since then, his signature style of deeply layered pieces, both physically and conceptually, has challenged how we see and interpret the cities around us. 

William's creative process is as intricate as his final work. He begins with a drawing, often a warped, panoramic, or fish eye perspective of familiar city scenes, which is then translated into a foam-core relief sculpture. This process gives his work a tactile, three-dimensional quality that sets it apart from conventional cityscapes. 

The real transformation of the piece begins when William starts to incorporate found objects into the work such as bread tabs, washers, screws, credit cards, and other fragments. These items are embedded into the surface, painted over, and then seamlessly incorporated into the composition becoming part of the overall scene. 

The use of found objects, also known as objet trouvé, French for found object, and often referred to as readymades, is a practice that challenges traditional ideas of what constitutes art. Rather than crafting every element by hand, the artist incorporates everyday items, into the artwork. 

While this practice rose to its zenith in the early 20th century with both the Dada and Surrealist movements, with Marcel Duchamp's Fountain considered one of the most well known readymades, the tradition of using found objects stretches back even further. The practice is inherently subversive, questioning the boundaries between art and life, high and low culture, and craftsmanship and concept. William takes this earlier practice and adapts it to a modern urban context. 

His use of street-level ephemera becomes a visual metaphor: beauty isn't separate from the mundane, it is imbued into it. 

William often focuses on Kansas City landmarks like Union Station, the Western Auto Building, the Kauffman Center, as well as other cityscapes like New York City. 

Viewers often perceive William's wall sculptures as architectural drawings until they look closer. Once they do, the perspective bends, the surfaces change, and the viewer finds small unfamiliar items, like a crushed bottle cap or a plastic army man. 

These objects add texture and dimension, but also serve as a social commentary. William's pieces show the true city, not the picture perfect version, but the layered and worn version, rooted in a sense of reality. From afar, the city may be perfect, but only from a distance. 

William's work has been placed with private and corporate collectors including: H&R Block Headquarters, the Kansas City Royals, Saint Luke's Hospital, Fishtech Security, KCP&L, Seigfreid Bingham LP, Creative Planning Wealth Management, the Overland Park Convention Center, Kansas State University, Superior Bowen, the Helzberg Family and more. 

Live Inspired. -HC