Mary Pat Wager
Transforming discarded materials into form, memory and presence. Working from the Hudson Valley for over four decades.
“Every material carries a past life. My work is about listening to it.”
The Alchemy of Forgotten Things
INSIDE THE STUDIO
A short film about Mary Pat Wager's Hudson Valley studio — the reclaimed materials, the process, and the quiet conviction that has driven four decades of practice.
THE PRACTICE
Mary Pat Wager is a multidisciplinary artist working in sculpture, painting and assemblage.
For over four decades she has transformed discarded industrial materials into striking, poetic forms –
long before sustainability entered
the cultural conversation.
Selected Works
SCULPTURE · ASSEMBLAGE · INSTALLATION · CLAY – HUDSON VALLEY, UPSTATE NY
ASSEMBLAGE, OPEN FACE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
BROKEN PROMISES, ASSEMBLAGE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
ESSENCE, WALL SCULPTURE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
FAITH MILLS INSTALLATION Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
INNERMOST, WALL SCULPTURE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
NATURAL AFFAIR, WALL SCULPTURE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
SELF PORTRAIT, ASSEMBLAGE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
CRANK IT, FREESTANDING Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
DOMESTIC WITHDRAWAL, INSTALLATION Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
MONUMENTS, FREESTANDING Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
UNHINGED, WALL SCULPTURE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
FINAL DISTRIBUTION, WALL SCULPTURE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
ASCENSION, FREESTANDING Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
EXTRUDING SEQUENCE, WALL SCULPTURE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
CRAZED, ASSEMBLAGE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
DISCONNECT, WALL SCULPTURE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
TRICKLE DOWN, ASSEMBLAGE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
SPECIMEN, ASSEMBLAGE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
HEIRLOOM, ASSEMBLAGE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
NAVIGATOR, WALL SCULPTURE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
DISPLACED PERSON, FREESTANDING Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
NAVIGATOR, WALL SCULPTURE Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
AGARIRAN, FREESTANDING, OUTDOOR Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
BOX TOWER, INSTALLATION Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
MASK FORESTER. CLAY Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
MASK MOON, CLAY Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
CLAY MASK #1, CLAY Steel, wood, found objects • 1987
SUSTAINABILITY40+
YEARS OF PRACTICE
60+
EXHIBITIONS & SHOWS
100%
RECLAIMED MATERIALS
∞
SECOND LIVES GIVEN
Long before sustainability became a movement,
Mary Pat Wager was pulling beauty from
what the world had abandoned.
Forty years of studio practice rooted in one conviction: that discarded industrial materials carry latent form. That rust is not an ending. That the worn, the cast-off, the overlooked has something left to say.
A Half-Century of Making
STUDIO & ARCHIVE
In the Studio. 2024.
First Studio, 1970s.
Being interviewed, 2025.
Masters Exhibition, 1979.
As featured on PBS.
“It is my goal to make work that preserves history, evokes memories and communicates to the viewer.”
PBS Interview with Mary Pat Wager, “Breathing New Life Into Discarded Material”
“I deconstruct. I weld. I reassemble — forcing disparate objects into new relationships, new conversations they were never meant to have.
The process is a kind of translation: I am not imposing meaning onto these things.
I am listening for what they can say to each other when brought close enough to speak.
The resulting sculptures address what I cannot stop thinking about — environmental erosion, political fracture, personal loss, the daily labor of existing in this particular moment on Earth.”
For exhibition opportunities, acquisitions, curatorial inquiries, press requests, speaking invitations, or collaborations, please complete the inquiry form.
