Artist Blog : William Wegman

Roller Rover

William Wegman was born in Holyoke, Massachusetts, in 1943. He first receive his BFA in painting from the Massachusetts College of Arts, and then went on to receive his MFA in 1967 in the study of painting and printmaking at the University of Illinois. He became interested in photography and video after teaching at a variety of colleges, and universities, which began his journey as a photographer.

While teaching at the California State University, Wegman obtained his first Weimaraner named Man Ray who became the most famous of the dogs he photographs. In 1986, Fay Ray became apart of Wegman's family and another subject of his works. With his Polaroid 20 x 24 camera in hand at this time, he was ready to begin his journey into photography, videography, painting, and drawing for years to come.

Hat Tender

Each one of his pictures aims to integrate surrealism, satire, comedy, and anthropomorphizing to reach the ultimate purpose of the piece. He explains that the purpose of his work is to not just photograph dogs acting seemly comedic, but instead “the pictures [should] puncture the regal bearing of the beautiful dogs and surround the animals with the absurd artifacts of everyday human life.” Through his work he also explores the themes of nature, transcendentalism, and the way in which people try to comprehend the world around them.

My favorite image that he created is Hat Tender. Through this piece Wegman is able to draw parallels between the dog model and human beings in general.The dog seems to be expressionless and clearly anthropomorphized through the use of the hat covering his eyes. The background colored allows full focus to be directly on the puppy with the hat. It strikes me at first as an hysterical piece of work, as does a large majority of his pieces, however it contains in depth meanings about human life and the natural world without spelling it out directly.