Mary Filer is a pioneer in Canadian glass art. Her works are essentially sculptures created by laminating planal glass, clear and coloured, to form both geometric and fluid compositions. While she has often worked on a heroic scale, she is equally comfortable making small tabletop assemblages.
Recent works evince a new freedom of expression – a controlled vernal exuberance – which she indulges by making crudities – massive assemblies of chunks of glass and antique shards – using geometric structures to realize primordial forces and balances – structures based on planal relations expressed through transparency, light and colour.
Mary Filer has been a respected and honored artist for five decades. She is an educator, muralist, a painter, a sculptor, a benefactor, a collector and an inspiration to her peers.