Water Writes The Garden
January 15 - April 10, 2026
Water Writes the Garden unites photographs, sculptures, and poetry around water’s role as timekeeper and storyteller. It explores how water makes marks and sculpts environments through cyclical formation and erosion. Centered on the notion that water writes, washes, and rewrites the land, the work invites people into slow rhythms of memory. I want the works to ask: What does water remember? And what does it write into the landscape? Here, gardens are both cultivated and fugitive.
"Over and over and" by Mary Mattingly
"I was raised in an agricultural town near Springfield, Massachusetts, where the local drinking water was contaminated by agricultural chemicals. That experience shaped my understanding of clean water as both increasingly rare and a fundamental right—and it deepened my resolve to protect it. Since 2001, I’ve lived in New York City, creating sculptural ecosystems that prioritize access to food, shelter, and water. My work often takes the form of participatory public projects rooted in care, ecological awareness, and collective imagining." - Mary Mattingly
Mary Mattingly is an interdisciplinary artist whose work explores ecological relationships through sculptural ecosystems, performative installations, and research-based collaborations. Rooted in a deep inquiry into urban ecology and interdependence, her work addresses urgent issues around water, food systems, and climate adaptation.
Her public projects, such as Swale, a floating food forest in New York City’s waterways; Waterpod, a self-sufficient living structure on a barge; and the Flock House Project, a series of mobile habitats, reimagine civic infrastructure through community engagement and poetic provocation.
Mattingly’s work has been exhibited at the Brooklyn Museum, St orm King Art Center, the International Center ofPhotography, MoMA, the Barbican, Seoul Art Center, and the Palais de Tokyo. She has received fellowships and residencies from the Guggenheim Foundation, the Yale School of Art, A Blade of Grass, and the Anchorage Museum among others. Her work has been featured in Art21, The New York Times, and Le Monde.
At the core of Mattingly’s practice is a belief in art as a form of investigation and a tool for imagining adaptive futures. Her installations often function both symbolically and practically: creating space for gathering, co-learning, and reflecting on systems of resource extraction and ecological resilience.
Exhibiting Artist(s)
Mary Mattingly