Wegman World

An excerpt from William Wegman: Puppies

In honor of a photo shoot WW did last week with a group of young subjects, we're reprinting an excerpt from William Wegman: Puppies, about the first time he photographed Fay's puppies: 

"Photographing puppies in the first two weeks is simple. Just set them down, or up, and shoot. Group them together in various formations. Watch them flow into one another – one organism, seeking heat and its mother’s scent. Their eyes don’t open until they are about two weeks old. Fay didn’t mind me photographing her and her puppies. She looked sweet and slightly cross-eyed, high on life.

She did, however, pay close attention whenever I took a puppy away for a picture. As long as they were in view, Fay was okay. But separating one from the rest was upsetting to the puppies. They needed to be returned quickly to their mates…….

 At a couple of days old, the puppies were more alien than cute. Their tiny footpads and flip-tab ears made them look like cheaply made vinyl toys. Their ears were sealed shut, as were their soft, bulging eye sockets. And they were striped! These markings were to fade to gray in three days, which is typical, but at that moment, when I first began to photograph them, the puppies were the most beautiful velvety gray with silver stripes running down their backs."

 

 

Photographs courtesy Kimberly M. Wang/ eardog.com

Flo is Four!

Happy Fourth Birthday, Flo! There will be cake.....

Chairs Old and New

 

The photographs in William Wegman: Good Dogs on Nice Furniture, currently on view at Imago Galleries in Palm Desert, California, show Wegman’s always agreeable dogs posed on furniture by Herman Miller, Charles and Ray Eames, and George Nelson. In honor of this new body of work, we're looking back at one well-loved prop from the early days: namely, a chair that made its way back to him from California to New York, years after he left his studio there.

Here’s what WW has to say about that chair:

“This chair was in my studio in Santa Monica. That was about the third year I was working on photos. I started in Wisconsin, then when I moved to L.A., I was teaching at Cal State Long Beach and living in San Pedro. I got Man Ray the first month that I moved to L.A. in 1970, and he became an occasional prop and collaborator both in video and in these early photo pieces.

This chair was one of six like it. I don’t remember how I got them. They became used as a simple prop. A chair is always used in philosophy as a demonstrator, and so I used it in that sense, too, just as a basic prop. I like the way that it was so simple and non-decorative -- kind of absurdly so in some of them. The most significant work that I can remember is a video called Massage Chair, where I specifically pretend that it is one. As far as the photo pieces, I used it in one sentence work Paris In The Spring, where I added another “The,” which you may or may not notice.

When I moved to New York--I thought temporarily -- I loaned and then ultimately gave my studio to John Baldessari, and when I was stopping in to visit my studio and John, I noticed a chair there and was really excited about it. John mailed it to me two or three years ago, and that is why I have it.”

 

 

Roller Rover now on 20 x 200!

Prints of the iconic 1987 polaroid Roller Rover are available now on 20 x 200! Here's what WW says about creating the piece:

"I happened to have two pair of matching roller skates when I brought Fay to the Polaroid 20x24 studio at 588 Broadway that day in 1987, but was not expecting her to actually be able to perform in them as well as she did. The trick was to tilt the back skate to thwart the rolling. I took four or five shots, and the best was this version, with her head looking back.  Fay was about a year and a half old and had the ideal figure for skating, I think."

 

 

Bloglove: CNN

 

"Dogs' personalities shine through in front of the camera, he said. It was true for Man Ray, who became "very calm and interested" when Wegman would point a camera at him. Same goes for Flo and Topper, who "loves to be on top of things."

"'You really fall in love with them taking their pictures,' he said. 'You learn so much about them.'"

 

Read the rest of the article here.

Bobbin is 15!

Bobbin turned 15 today, and is officially the oldest Wegman dog. Read WW's birthday post on Bobbin from last year.

Flo & Wendell Explore

 

WW's new children's book, Flo & Wendell Explore, is in stores now! Check out the trailer to see some of what inspired the book: dogs in the Maine woods.

Also, join WW and Topper tomorrow at 1pm at Books of Wonder in NYC for the launch event for the book! We will be giving out these exclusive posters with purchase. Details here.

 

CONTEST: Photo Alliance, judged by WW

William Wegman, Black/White/Gray Background, 1971/2012

Attention photographers! Photo Alliance is running a photo contest, to be judged by William Wegman. Find out more here. Submissions due 9/15.

BLOGLOVE: Hyperallergic

 

 

Curious about the weird and wonderul New Order video that WW collaborated on? Hyperallergic attempts to shed some light.

Love books?

WW will be at the Decatur Book Festival this weekend! Come by on Sunday for a panel discussion on animals in children's literature, and a signing of the new Flo & Wendell Explore.

More details here.