1965, Round Hay Bales

Object NamePastel

Artist / Maker Ellen Wagener (American, b. 1964)

Date2014

Mediumpastel on paper

Dimensions40 × 60 in. (101.6 × 152.4 cm)

ClassificationsDrawings

Credit Line"1965, Round Hay Bales" is presented to the University Museums’ permanent collection in honor of Dr. Wesley F. Buchele. Dr. Buchele was a Professor of agricultural engineering at Iowa State and originated several agricultural safety courses, the first of their kind in the country. He is a renowned farm safety expert. Dr. Buchele also developed several patents, including one for the large round baler. This acquisition to the permanent collection is provided by Ellen Wagener, the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and the University Museums. In the Art on Campus Collection, University Museums, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa.

Object numberU2015.68

Status

On view

Collections

CultureAmerican

Label TextFrom the University Museums Collections Handbook, vol. 2, 2025: In this work of art, Ellen Wagener depicts a field of hay, with round bales dotting the landscape. The department commissioned the work of art to honor of Dr. Wes Buchele (1920–2017), a longtime professor of Agricultural Engineering at Iowa State. During his tenure at Iowa State, Buchele was awarded a patent for a round baler, the form almost all hay in the world is harvested and stored today. Before this innovation, farmers collected hay in small rectangular bales small enough to be carried by human hand. Wagener’s fields with round bales pay subtle tribute to Buchele’s agricultural legacy. Ellen Wagener’s pastel drawings are represented both in the public art and in the permanent collection at Iowa State. The public works of art in the Art on Campus Collection have been acquired by departments across campus. Many of Wagener’s pastels of weather systems playing out above fields of crops in this collection are tied to the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. Elings Hall, home to the Department of Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering, focuses on the weather systems depicted by Wagener in her pastels of storms and cyclones.

Locations