A small bite of the currency arrangements of Mark Wagner. A couple of these images have blown up on diggish sites, but not much info on the artist. Here he is. His name is Mark Wagner, and here is his Currency Collage.

Get to know Mark Wagner! He is a dude who enjoys snail-type-mail, hates the internet, and loves to collage with dollar bills.

Artist, writer, publisher, etcetera
Inquire about currency collage at Pavel Zoubok Gallery
Inquire about artists books at The Booklyn Artists Alliance
Inquire about creative design solutions at X-ing Design
In the Chicago area contact Western Exhibitions

Postal mail: 139 Emerson Place #406, Brooklyn, NY 11205
A personal aversion to electronic mail makes it best to send old fashioned written correspondence, if you simply must send electronic mail, be advised that I might not answer for several weeks.

Electronic mail: mark@x-ingdesign.com

SHORT BIOGRAPHICAL STATEMENT
Mark Wagner was born quietly in the rural Midwest at the tail end of thirteen children. Since leaving the sandbox at the age of fourteen, he has continued his creative career in the fields of writing, collage, and bookmaking. He is co-founder (currently president) of The Booklyn Artists Alliance, and has published books under the name Bird Brain Press.

Wagner’s work is collected by dozens of institutions including the Museum of Modern Art, The Walker Art Center, the Library of Congress, and the Smithsonian Institution. It has shown at The Metropolitan Museum, The Getty Research Institute, The Venice Biennial, and The Brooklyn Museum.

STATEMENT ON COLLAGE WITH CURRENCY
The one dollar bill is the most ubiquitous piece of paper in America. Collage asks the question: what might be done to make it something else? It is a ripe material: intaglio printed on sturdy linen stock, covered in decorative filigree, and steeped in symbolism and concept. Blade and glue transform it-reproducing the effects of tapestries, paints, engravings, mosaics, and computers-striving for something bizarre, beautiful, or unbelievable… the foreign in the familiar.

GENERAL CREATIVE STATEMENT
My creative production includes work in many media: from writing and artist bookmaking to drawing, collage, and assemblage. Though varied, this work is far from eclectic-forming several discrete bodies that both stand on their own and link in nature and theme to their counterparts.

In whatever media employed I have a tendency toward meticulous production and solid graphic presentation. Usually fantastical, occasional surreal, and often interdisciplinary- I am satisfied only when concept and craft meet on equally firm footing.

What a nice man, it seems. Look at his dollars!

And feel free to pick one up for my birthday if you happen to have a ton of cash laying around, or if you can convince Mark Wagner to make me something, I would not be averted to that either.

The first time I realized the power of the dollar as a canvas, it was near the end of the first run of the band Rage Against the Machine. They had a webpage at the time, (still at http://ratm.com/ now,) and the front “welcome page” was a dollar with something written on it like “the only bit of parchment noone will destroy.” OR something like that.

And it was pretty powerful to me, so my young mind decided the best thing to do was to make all the Washingtons into Jokers. Not that I actually ended up doing it though, of course.

Viva la intaglio.