William Wegman

William Wegman: Video Work 1970-1999

From 1970-1977 William Wegman created some of the most innovative and important works in the history of video. These early pioneering tapes were created using minimal technology and a few studio props, including Wegman’s canine companion, Man Ray. Consisting of 130 works, some no longer than a television commercial, blurred the boundaries between high and low art as well as art and commerce, and have become a major chapter in the histories of contemporary art and film. This exhaustive compilation has been assembled by the artist with restored material and it contains all nine original reels as well as two later reels. Classics such as Pocketbook Man, Milk/Floor, Stomach Song, Cape On, Stick and Tooth, Spelling Lesson, Dog Duet, Man Ray, Do You Want to? Are included.

William Wegman's Mother Goose

Mother Goose tries to teach her son, Simon Goose, how to rhyme using some of her famous nursery rhymes.

Alphabet Soup

William Wegman and his dogs - Fay Ray, Batty, Chundo, and Crooky - teach children the alphabet.

The World of Photography

Artists Michael Smith and William Wegman — both of whom use conceptual humor as an art-making strategy — collaborated on this satirical commentary on photography, the process of image-making, and the interchange of "high" art and "low" culture. The tape is structured as an instructional guide that advances the "slice of life" method, imparting not only technique, but attitude and approach to the subject of photography. Wegman plays the world-weary artiste, a professional photographer who takes the innocent and earnest Mike under his tutelage. The business of art, the "reality" of the photographic image, and its pervasive role in contemporary culture are among the issues that receive irreverent treatment in this comedic collaboration.

Video: The New Wave

The New Wave is the seminal compendium of independent video work in the early 1970s. Written and narrated by Brian O'Doherty, this overview of the emerging video field includes examples of guerrilla television and "street" documentaries, early explorations with image-processing and synthesis, and performance video. This historical anthology includes excerpts of tapes by the following video pioneers: Stephen Beck and Warner Jepson, Peter Campus, Douglas Davis, Ed Emshwiller, Bill Etra, Frank Gillette, Don Hallock, Joan Jonas, Richard Serra, Paul Kos, Nam June Paik, Otto Piene, Willard Rosenquist, Dan Sandin, James Seawright, Steina Vasulka, TVTV, Stan Vanderbeek and William Wegman.

Dog Duet

"In the piece we see the two dogs staring at the camera in a dark room. Their eyes are intently following something off camera. Sometimes their head movement is pull into the action as they crane to follow the whatever it is in various left right and up down directions. At one point the action seems to stop and the dogs begin to blink in syncopation. At this point Hooka settles down into a lying position but Man Ray remains riveted. Towards the end piece the dogs crane to look behind them and at one miraculous moment their motions counter each other. At the end we see the object of their attention…in my hand, a tennis ball."

New & Used Car Salesman

William Wegman's lewd stroking of his dog apes television's crass marketing strategies.