Le cinéma Spoutnik invite le centre pour l’image contemporaine de saint-gervais à Genève à montrer un séléction de courts-métrages de William Wegman avec son chien Man Ray.
Biography
William Wegman grew up in Western Massachusetts, attended art school in
Boston and Illinois, taught in Wisconsin, then made his way out to California
in 1970 where he got his first Weimaraner. He named him Man Ray. Man Ray
became a central figure in Wegman’s photographs and videotapes, known
in the art world and beyond for his endearing deadpan presence. In 1972
Wegman and Man Ray moved to New York and continued this collaboration
which lasted twelve years. In 1982, Man Ray was named “Man of the
Year” by the Village Voice.
Wegman’s photographs, videotapes, paintings and drawings have been
exhibited in museums and galleries internationally. A retropective of
his work traveled to museums throughout Europe and the United States including
the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York. His most reccent exhibitions
include travelling retrospectives of his work in Japan and the United
States and a large scale survey of his drawings in France. In addition
to video segments that have appeared regularly on Sesame Street since
1989, William Wegman has also created film and video works for Saturday
Night Live and Nickelodeon. In 1996, Wegman’s film The Hardly Boys
in Hardly Gold, starring his favorite actors, was screened at the Sundance
Film Festival. Wegman’s most recent video, Mother Goose (Sony Wonder/
Children’s Television Workshop) had its World Premier Screening this
year at the Chicago Children’s International Film Festival. His other
works include the books, Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, ABC, 123,
Circle Triangle Square, Farm Days and Mother Goose (all Hyperion), and
the videos Alphabet Soup, Fay’s Twelve Days of Christmas. (WarnerVision).
Video
My video from the 70's invloved a closed circuit set up whereby I performed
to the live image on the monitor and not to the camera. I could be looking
at myself in profile at the same time as the recording. I am attentive
to the closed mirrorlike nature of video...the almost mesmerizing effect
of the image in the monitor in relation to the subject.
I think I am a very tech sensitive artist in that I don't over reach the
media. In fact, I revel in the limits.
How many dogs do you have?
That’s a complicated question. The simple answer is two. The complicated
answer is four. I live with two and work with two more.
Do the dogs mind being dressed?
No. I never treat it as a joke. I go about dressing them in a routine
matter of fact manner never allowing them to be submitted to ridicule.
Their time dressed is usually only seconds until the exposure is made.
In film or video its more complicated and they are up a little longer.
Every dog is an individual. Chundo doesn’t like to sit long but is
the most eager to work. Chip doesn’t mind hats. Chundo does. Batty
falls asleep while posing with or without costume. Crooky, like Chundo
is eager and some what hyper although she stays really well. She looks
great in blond wigs (see Goldilocks video) but they do hide her magnificent
ears. Batty always looks sweet and dreamy. Fay looked evil in wigs.. hence
her role as stepmother in Cinderella.
How did you get started?
My background is in painting but in school in the sixties, like many artists
of that time, I believed that painting was dead. I began to work in collaboration
with other artists in music and technology in the creation of performances
and installation works. Soon after I started making video pieces and photographic
works .of my performances and installations and in the process became
fascinated with the media itself. Before long I was setting things up
just for the camera. in video and photography. In l970 I got a dog and
he turned out to be very interested in video and photography as well.
(see next question)
When did you get your first dog
September l970. I promised my wife when we moved to California (from Wisconsin)
we would get a dog. She wanted a short haired male dog,, with spots,-
preferably white with black. We couldn’t find any like that in the
Long Beach area. Someone said Weimaraners are good dogs, and they were
svelt. I had never heard of them. The next day we say an ad in the newspaper,
Weimaraner puppies for sale: $ 35. We went to see. Only one male, round,
plump, gray, - disinterested. She wanted him. I wasn’t sure. A coin
toss would decide. Heads no Tails yes. Tails. 5 straight. We got him and
brought him to our new home in San Pedro, Ca. His name came to me in a
ray of inspiration. “Man Ray!” He looked like a little man.
He had a lot of ideas for me.
Does it bother the dogs?
After 20 years of doing this, I know their limitations, what isn't good
for them and what makes them unhappy, and I stay within those boundaries,
or if I transgress them I don't pursue it. The cruel thing is to neglect
the dog, to not work with them. Anyone who's watched us work sees that
the dogs perform willingly. Sometimes they're blase about it, and sometimes
they're excited or enthusiastic, but they're not afraid.
Do they get tired of working?
Dogs are bred to work with humans, and to not work with them is to neglect
them. I know from experience they get very sad when they're not involved.
Weimaraners in particular like games a lot, and they see it as an interactive
game. The more serious the endeavor the more they thrive on it-and despite
my silly photographs, it's serious work and the dogs take it seriously.
A dog trainer told me that I made Man Ray very smart by asking him a lot
of questions and by working with him.
Man Ray
(1970-1982)
The first photographs and videotapes which I made of Man Ray show him
doing his normal everyday dog things: eating and drinking, sleeping, wanting
to go out, wanting to come in, chewing stuff, retrieving pocketbooks,
a microphone, plastic bowling pins and other normal everyday studio art
supplies. I began to invent games for him, holding him back and then letting
him go into the picture/camera frame. On his own he began to sit still
and watch me watching him through the camera, his gaze zooming into the
lens. We worked every day. I kept thinking up new things for him to do.
I didn't think much about him after awhile. He was just there, ready for
anything. By the time he was six months, I could easily put him into any
pose I could think of (basically: sit, stand, lie down). He had an uncanny
sense of where the video camera and microphone where. Posing became second
nature to him, patiently watching as I constructed the set, set up lights,
tinkered with the equipment...mused.
When Man Ray was two we moved to New York dividing out time between a
lower manhatten loft on Crosby St and East Hampton Long Island factory
buiding which a friend had loaned me. I had a hard time asjusting to the
city although Man Ray did just fine. He loved garbage. Crosby St. was
well supplied in l972. In East Hampton we did some of our best work together.
Videos like spelling lesson and photos like Before/On/After: Permutations
where Man Ray appears to know more than he should. This is the begining
of my teasing anthropormorphisms which stand out from this period.