William Wegman, How They are Toward Newspapers, 1973
July 27th is Man Ray's birthday. Man Ray was WW's first weimaraner, and the first dog he worked with in the studio.
"Some dogs don't like to be stared at. Man Ray required it. Surrounded by light-boxes that flanked the cyclopean eye of the big camera, he was truly at ease, never balking as I studied him for new possibilities. As the strobes pop in a blast of light, Man Ray appears in afterimage. So illuminated, he begins to glow, growing larger in my mind. In the act of being photographed he becomes magnified." William Wegman, 2002
William Wegman, Fey Ray, 1979
On the transition from black and white to color photography with Man Ray:
"I distrusted color. Sensuous, romantic, elusive color. Color was...well...colorful. On my third day with the (polaroid) camera, a bottle of Revlon red nail polish made its way on to the set with Man Ray. The little bottle was acceptable. It wasn't simply red. It was red nail polish. As I applied it to Man Ray's toenails I convinced myself that it was okay. No one could accuse me of using color subjectively. After positioning Ray on the black set paper and composing the frame, I said, "shake." As he raised his paw with the painted toenails, I snapped the shutter, and seventy-five seconds later -- color! There was no denying it." - William Wegman, 2002
William Wegman, Contemplating Art, Life, and Photography, 1975-9
"Since his death in 1982, Ray's come back to me in dreams eight or nine
times to save me from big problems. When I used to work on drawings and
paintings, Ray would get jealous because he hated being ignored, and
when I first started painting again in 1986 Ray came back to me in a
dream. He was speaking to me in English and he said, 'Now wait a minute
Bill, we don't have to do this. We can do some photographs right now. Or
perhaps a video.'" - WW, in the Los Angeles Times, 1988