Wednesday, December 7, 2011

William Wegman


Alli Williams
William Wegman
William Wegman is described as a pioneer video artist, photographer, painter, and writer. Wegman started his art career as a painter at the Massachusetts College of Art.  He received his Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in 1965, and two years later received his Master of Fine Arts at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.  While painting is what Wegman focused on in college, it is not the medium for which he is most famous for today.
After graduating from the University of Illinois, he began teaching.  He started at the University of Wisconsin, and in 1970 moved to Southern California to teach at California State College, Long Beach for a year.  Wegman’s work began appearing in galleries and museums worldwide in the early 1970s, including the Situation Gallery in London and the Sonnabend Gallery in Paris and New York (3).  Although he lived on food stamps for a year before people started to pay attention to his photographs and videos, by the mid-’70s Wegman’s work began receiving both critical and popular acclaim,” wrote Kevin Conley in his article on Salon.com (5).
The most popularized work of Wegman’s are his photo series and video work of his Weimaraners.  While teaching in Long Beach, Wegman adopted his dog, Man Ray, who was the first of his many Weimaraners to become the subject of his photographs and videos.  “Our new puppy and my interest in photo and video as art mediums were practically coincidental,” said Wegman in an interview with Housepet Magazine (9).  Man Ray was the subject of Wegman’s first video titled Split Screen.  Man Ray died in 1981, and was named “Man of the Year” by a New York City newspaper publication, The Village Voice a year later (4).  Wegman didn’t get another dog until 1986, another Weimaraner named Fay Ray.  With Fay Ray, Wegman began using his Polaroid again.  The offspring of Fay Ray began the growth of Wegman’s subjects, and his portfolio of work expanded.  He took many pictures of his Weimaraner family, as well as video shorts and books (9).
Wegman began creating children’s books with his dogs, with stories like Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Mother Goose, and others (3).  Wegman has also published books for adults including Man’s Best Friend, Fashion Photographs and William Wegman, and Fay.  Many of Wegman’s video works have been featured on Saturday Night Live and Nickelodeon, and he has been creating work for Sesame Street since 1989 (3).  His videos like Alphabet Soup and Fay’s Twelve Days of Christmas feature his dog Fay Ray and other Weimaraners dressed up like people being put into human situations.  The dogs have a deadpan expression for the most part, and seem to be utterly disinterested in what is going on.  This adds to the humor of Wegman’s videos, which, in this case, cater mostly to children viewers.  These video works are very different from his earlier videos from the 1970s.
From 1970 to 1977, Wegman created short videos that were very dry in humor, and quick to get to the point.  His featured video on his website is Spelling Lesson which was created in 1973-74, and shows Wegman reading the results of a spelling test back to his dog.  The dog gives Wegman confused looks each time Wegman spells the word out.  The video works because Wegman is so serious in the situation, and his sarcastic nature makes this particular short funny.
Not all of Wegman’s work is focused on his Weimaraners.  Many of his video shorts from the 1970s are of just him, or of inanimate objects that he gives voices to.  The video, Randy’s Sick from 1970-71 shows lamps that are talking to each other, and one lamp is saying that ‘Randy’ is about to be sick.  Other early videos without his dogs are Stomach Song (1970-71), Massage Chair (1972 – 73) and Crooked Finger (1972-73) (3).  The video work without the dogs is the same type of dry humor that he uses with the dogs, and the quick comical pieces work together as a cohesive collection of work very well.
In an interview with Liz Béar, Wegman discussed the kind of artwork that he is interested in. “I tend not to like short things that are funny and quick, that are more like my own work.  The kind of art that I like and the books I like to read are usually long and involved,” said Wegman (10).  It is interesting that he tends to like work that is long and involved, and that he is indifferent in work similar to his own.  “In art school you’re required to study other art…Even if you didn’t want to.  I had always thought it was important not to have art references in my work, because it would limit the audience,” said Wegman in the book, Funney/Strange.  This shows that Wegman likes to branch out his interests so that he isn’t stuck in just one aspect of art, and also so that he can have a much broader audience with a variety of interests.
Wegman’s original artistic medium was in drawing and painting.  He has received many awards and grants for his work from some of the most impressive art institutions in the country (9).  His paintings and drawings are unlike any other work of his.  Some of his more notable paintings we created in the mid 1980s, and he is still creating paintings today in conjunction with his photographs and video.  His later paintings depict scenery, and tend to be surreal, such as Look at That, which was done in 2007.  His paintings are mostly oil paintings done on canvas.  Most of his paintings do not include his Weirmaraners, and are not seen to be outright comical like his video and most of his photographic work.  The paintings speak to his more serious side, and show his diversity in creating artwork.
While there are many parallels between Wegman’s video work and photographs, some things are different within the two mediums. “…The absence of that time element is what makes the photographs interesting for me to do which is why I do both,” said Wegman in his interview with Béar (10).  His photos are almost exclusively of his dogs, with the exception of some of his earlier photographs.  His videos include both his dogs and himself as the subject.  There are many videos unrelated to his dogs that Wegman has created, and these videos are all shorts either with inanimate object or Wegman himself.  There are several photos of Wegman’s dogs, most of which are juxtaposing them against human situations and dressing them up people.  In many of his videos, especially the early videos, the dogs are not human like.  However the video works he created for Sesame Street and other videos show his dogs with human limbs and acting in human situations.  Both his video and photography work share a common theme, and that is the comical deadpan humor seen both with his dogs, and with himself as the subject.
In a lot of Wegman’s work, he includes himself as a main or contributing subject.  Wegman included himself in his works simply as an extension of using domestic subject material. The effect of his using his own body is strong and is repeated later in his videotapes,” wrote Lavin in her Notes on William (12).  His choice to include himself in his art shows Wegman as a performance artist as well as a photographer and filmmaker.
            Today, Wegman is still creating art and showing in galleries.  His most recent solo exhibition was in Dusseldorf, Germany in 2011.  His prints can be bought in galleries and online, and prices range anywhere from $50 to $1000 for a framed photograph (7).  At the age of 68, Wegman is currently living in New York City, NY.  He continues growing his family of Weimaraners, and has a wife and children of his own.  Wegman’s work, old and new, has a vast audience.  His portfolio ranges from oil paintings, to video shorts, and black and white prints.  His work, which is not entirely cohesive, portrays who Wegman is as an artist and the vast recognition of all his artwork shows his importance in the art world.





References
1.    Wegman, William. William Wegman: Polaroids. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 2002. Print.
2.    Simon, Joan, and William Wegman. William Wegman: Funney/strange. Andover, MA: Addison Gallery of American Art, Phillips Academy, 2006. Print.
3.    William Wegman. Web. 07 Dec. 2011. <http://www.wegmanworld.com/>.
4.    "William Wegman | Art21 | PBS." PBS: Public Broadcasting Service. Web. 07 Dec. 2011. <http://www.pbs.org/art21/artists/william-wegman>.
5.    Conley, Kevin. "William Wegman." Salon.com. 08 Feb. 2000. Web. 07 Dec. 2011. <http://www.salon.com/2000/02/08/wegman/>.
6.    "William Wegman." Sperone Westwater. Web. 07 Dec. 2011. <http://www.speronewestwater.com/cgi-bin/iowa/artists/record.html?record=49>.
7.    "20x200 | Artists - William Wegman." 20x200 | Affordable Art Prints. Web. 07 Dec. 2011. <http://www.20x200.com/artists/william-wegman.html>.
8.    Ayata, Asli. "William Wegman's Weimaraners." House Pet Magazine. Nov. 2005. Web. 07 Dec. 2011. <http://www.housepetmagazine.com/two/wegman.htm>.
9.    Eason, Antonio. "William Wegman Biography." People.WCSU. Web. 07 Dec. 2011. <http://people.wcsu.edu/mccarneyh/fva/W/William_Wegman.html>.
10. Béar, Liza. "Man Ray." Vasulka. Web. 07 Dec. 2011. <http://www.vasulka.org/archive/Artists9/Wegman,William/ManRay.pdf>.
11. Keller, Katie. "Featured Artist – William Wegman – December Daily #14." Katie Keller Photography. 14 Dec. 2010. Web. 07 Dec. 2011. <http://katiekellerphotography.com/featured-artist-william-wegman-december-daily-14/>.
12. Lavin, Mauv. Notes on William.  06 Dec 11.

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