I just put a handful of BIG EXPENSIVE ART up in my web shop. Is that gauche of me???
I've been frustrated over the years with galleries hiding their price list behind the front desk... or listing work as "price on request"... or assessing how someone is dressed before deciding weather or not to take them seriously. I'm ready for a little more transparency in the art world... so here's to transparency;)
Personally I LIKE interacting with people, hearing what they have to say, and answering questions. But I know some of you out there just want to know what's available and what's on the price tag. That's ok too.
HAVE A LOOK!!! and circle back around if you have any questions.
Best wishes,
Mark
MarkWagnerinc.com
FRONT PAGE of today's NEW YORK TIMES sports section. Head's still spinning and the studio's a mess from the deadline. But there it is on newsstands. Everywhere. I did the math and with a print circulation of 279K copies that's enough of this illustration to blanket the park down the street (Buchanan to you locals). Thanks to AD Timothy Oliver for both the opportunity and dialogue necessary to get here.
I'm like the least sporty person on the planet, but i've always related to professional athletes as fellow culture workers. Artists, writers, musicians, actors, athletes... break it down and we've all developed specialty skills and strive in order to entertain folks. Super excited that so many talented student-athletes are on the verge of getting a larger slice of the pie they've baked!!!
STUDENT HYPHEN ATHLETE, currency on panel, 16x12 inches.
@nytimes@timothypoliver
best wishes,
Mark
MarkWagnerinc.com
why i WASN'T answering your call last summer... 1951 CONSTITUTION AVENUE, currency on panel, 36x60 inches. with tiny BUSINESS CARD collage photographed for size comparison.
had to be HAMILTON driving the car since he's the only dude turned stage-right. i DID let the curator's team pick what car he'd be driving... which was probably a civilized conversation... but i like to imagine it was a heated discussion involving raised voices, cajoling, tears, and slamming doors ;)
FYI there are some cute little BUSINESS CARD size collages like that hanging out in my WEB SHOP. link in bio.
best wishes,
Mark
MarkWagnerinc.com
a RE-INTRO: hi i'm MARK WAGNER and i've got the DUMBEST JOB DESCRIPTION in the world. Every day i go to work and i cut up money. Since 1999 i've been cutting up money... yes REAL MONEY... and making art out of it. It's like the parody of a real job. At times it's every bit as tedious as the most tedious office or manufacturing job. But that's OK because i'm just the humble servant of my viewers... trying to show them something EXCITING made from something banal. Demonstrating through behavior a healthy disregard for money and its trappings.
I make PRETTY PICTURES and ABSTRACT money art. little and BIG art. ORIGINALS for SALE as well as for ILLUSTRATION. you can find some in my WEB SHOP along with T-SHIRTS, POSTERS, BOOKS and NONE DOLLAR BILLS. please have a look & sign up for my EMAIL LIST too!!!
if you'd like to READ MORE about some of the IDEAS behind the work, the ART BLOG section of my WEBSITE is both interesting and entertaining. maybe start with the FAQ essay there.
excerpt from MY UNAUTHORIZED AUTOBIOGRAPHY: Born at the tail end of thirteen children, Mark Wagner grew up rural-poor in central Wisconsin. A life-long remedial reader, Wagner was attracted to art at least partially due to its light reading load. He attended the University of Wisconsin Madison where he very nearly didn't get his BFA.
Wagner almost totally missed the '90s... distracted not just by drinking, sex, and drug use, but by esoteric experiments into collage, assemblage, and bookmaking. Not the gambling kind of bookmaking... the publishing kind. A formative 13 years in New York City have added a healthy dose of cynicism and 'tude to his folksy midwestern charm.
Wagner first exhibited his currency collage artworks on tax day in 2001 a stone's throw from Wall Street. He got hooked up with the big-G gallery world where his work was cast before the cognoscenti and shlepped to the usual art fairs. He had studio assistants, startling price tags, fancy openings attended by celebs... you know real grown-up stuff.
Now thoroughly middle-classed, he lives with his family in Lancaster Pencil-vania...playing with the kids, hawking his own wares, and plotting the downfall of capitalism.
-Mark
LANCASTER, PA friends, please help SPREAD THE WORD and COME CELEBRATE the brand new LANCASTER WORKSHOP & TOOL LIBRARY!!!
come to the GAND OPENING this Thursday May 14th at 4PM. 433 Ice Ave, Lancaster PA.
cofounders Emily Fritz & Gene Shaw have given us a new resource for building skills, sharing tools, and strengthening our community across the generations.
@lancworkshop
give them a follow.
read more on their mission.
become a member.
donate your dollars or under-used tools.
sign up to take or teach a class.
let's help them help all of us!!!
best wishes,
Mark
MarkWagnerinc.com
I've been building up a nice selection of CURRENCY COLLAGE PROPOSAL DRAWINGS... plans for works 40x30 inches, door sized, and even larger. These are all pieces i'd LOVE to make, but am holding off doing so until a COLLECTOR (maybe even you) COMMITS to purchasing them.
Let me "artsplain" for a moment... it is EFFING DIFFICULT (and borderline absurd) for artists to work constantly on spec... sinking months or years into, say, building up inventory for an exhibition... paying studio rent, materials, frames, yada yada all up front... just to build up IN-STOCK inventory someone may-or-may-not buy.
A 40x30" collage takes me 3 to 4 months to make. If i spend that time making a RAMPAGING MONSTER squashing George Washingtons, and you wanted a PRETTY PEACOCK, then neither of us get what we want. TIMES-FOUR and an entire year has gone by... i've got a pile of unsold artwork, and you've still got a blank space both on your wall and in your heart.
By encouraging COLLECTORS to PRE-ORDER based on proposal drawings (not all of the time, but at least some of the time) i'm hoping to build a more healthy, sustainable workflow. better for me because i know when a paycheck is coming. But also BETTER for THE COLLECTOR... giving them (or, er, YOU) both a larger selection of artwork to choose from, and a more exciting roll in the creative process.
If you've been waiting around for me to make the PERFECT LARGE PIECE... that room-anchoring SHOW STOPPER that you'd absolutely love AND hoping that you're lucky enough to get to it first... let me suggest that you just DON'T WAIT. be PROACTIVE!!!
This is not a new endeavor for me... just a change in emphasis. i've been making CUSTOM COLLAGES for COLLECTORS (and INSTITUTIONS) for years... working with art directors and/or curatorial teams who need to see proposal drawings in advance. i am much better at collage than i am at drawing, so the finished work is always an improvement and elaboration on the plans.
Reach out VIA EMAIL to discuss available proposals, pricing, scheduling, or to see side-by-side drawing-vs-completed-work comparisons.
Best wishes,
Mark
MarkWagnerinc.com
two NEW WINNERS now available in the WEB SHOP. look thither and yea shall behold: WATER UNDER THE BRIDGE or HASTE WITH THE HASTING CURRENT, currency on panel, 20x15 inches & AMBITIOUS SUSANS, currency on panel, 12x10 inches. both of these are framed in "forever frames" behind low-glare OPTIUM museum acrylic in powder-coated tig-welded aluminum frames with seamless corners.
not cheep. i know. but i've got a handful of more AFFORDABLE ART and CONSUMER GOODS projects in the works too. so stay tuned!!! and please SIGN UP for the EMAIL LIST on my WEBSITE for news and dibs on new projects.
best wishes,
Mark
MarkWagnerinc.com
just RESTOCKED my WEB SHOP with a handful of new BILL EXPLOSIONS (S,M,&L) all framed and ready to hang. my favorite among them is the biggun: REVISED THIRD QUARTER PROJECTIONS. but my favorite TITLE among them is for one of the smaller ones DO DOLLAR BILLS DREAM OF ELECTRONIC TRANSFER? ;) what can i say... when i'm not working on currency collage these days i'm working on secret SCI FI writing projects. anyway, please have a look in the WEB SHOP if you're feeling acquisitive.
excerpt from "THE BIG PICTURE, THOUGHTS ON THE BILL EXPLOSIONS”: Statistics show. Small shifts in a hundred-thousand individual viewpoints can have a large cumulative effect. Tendencies become ripples... ripples waves... a democracy of minute movement. Would everyone please take a tiny step to the left. Thank you. Individuals may measure well their own situation, but society needs someone like an economist to fathom the general trends.
They used to make bigger bills. Prior to paper conservation measures in the 1930s US bills were much larger pieces of paper. Larger denomination too... with five, ten, even hundred-thousand dollar notes used to move funds between regional banks. Today cash money is quickly becoming merely the metaphor for electronic money, and digital moneys are the smallest show on earth. A million bitcoins can dance on the head of a pin.
On the granular level these artworks are almost-grids like cells on a spreadsheet storing data. They owe allegiance to both the digital and the analog... equal parts subway mosaic and computer pixel graphic. They are imperfect in comforting ways. Like the warm crackle of an old victrola they warble, stutter, and glitch. Up close they are cinemagraphic. The images in each tiny square shift microscopically from frame to frame. Like film footage sans projector, it's almost as though no movement were taking place. At a distance you yourself become the projector, and the bills reconstitute writ large like some sort of mirage.
best wishes,
Mark
MarkWagnerinc.com
DRAWN vs. DELIVERED. this Martin Building sketch went through a couple rounds of revisions before moving on to the collage phase. the finished artwork… "AS SEEN FROM OWEN PARK", currency on panel, 40x40 inches... hangs prominently in the depicted building.
i shoehorn loads of details into these big pieces. i want people who see the work all the time to notice different details every time they look.
i work up sketches like this for all my commissioned pieces, so clients/collectors know just what to expect. given that i am such a ham-fisted draw-er, the collages always look much better than the plans ;)
best wishes,
mark
MarkWagnerinc.com
ELECTORAL COLLEGE or ELECTORAL COLLAGE ;) currency on panel, 40x30 inches. 538 Washington heads there... one for each US elector.
this one is long gone.
but i'm making more all the time.
best wishes,
Mark
MarkWagnerinc.com
Highlights from the May/June 2026 issue
What might change if our language began to reflect a more entangled relationship with the living world — one that is more relational, perhaps even guided by affection?
In May 1966, the first issue of Resurgence was published. That’s 60 years of stories and 60 years of asking how we might live more gently and more attentively within the living world. Across those years, the words we use — and the ways we use them — have helped to shape that asking.
When commissioning writers for the current issue of this magazine, Editor Dave Reeve invited them to avoid using the word ‘Nature’ altogether. In her introduction to the themed section, gardener and writer @decolonisethegarden (Sui Searle) writes: “The story of separation runs through our culture: that humans stand outside and above this thing we call ‘Nature'. Nature as object, as noun — distinct from us: something to be used in our service.”
Much of our language carries this inheritance. Words shape the stories we tell, and stories shape how we live our lives. The poet and writer @cosmogyny (Sophie Strand) says she doesn’t like to work by banishing words “by subtraction” and instead likes to “add enough on top of them that they meld and rot and grow something new”. Language, after all, is never fixed. In late Middle English, the word nature could also appear as a verb. To nature something was to bring it forth, to foster its growth, to nurture and sustain life. Perhaps the question, then, is how such shifts in language might shape the stories we tell today.
So the invitation to readers is this: how much do we need to rewrite our own texts? How much do we need to change the stories that we tell about the world — and about our place within it? And what might happen if, like the writers in this issue, we allowed our language to grow a little wilder?
Read our newsletter online at https://conta.cc/4sTSzuw - Visit the 'NEWSLETTERS' branch of our Linktree (see bio)
