Marc Selwyn Fine Art is pleased to present William Wegman: Art By Artist, a show of drawings, paintings and photographs dating from the early 1970s to the present. This marks Wegman’s fifth exhibition at the gallery. The show is curated by Andrew Lampert, editor of the recent book William Wegman: Writing By Artist (2022, Primary Information).
William Wegman: Art By Artist presents a concise overview of Wegman’s interdisciplinary practice with a special focus on his lifelong passion for art and music. Spanning five decades, the works collectively make visual and verbal art historic references that hearken back to the artist’s irreverent conceptual roots. Among the multitude of subjects are uproarious homages to a vast array of figures from Richard Serra and Josef Hoffman to Frank Sinatra and The Beatles. While the selected pieces bridge multiple eras and mediums, they readily demonstrate the consistent playfulness and signature humorous touch that permeates all of Wegman’s highly diverse output. The show spotlights the artist’s consistently comedic use of writing and language, most especially in his drawings. The title or the work often alters one’s read of the image, or sometimes the title appears within the work itself, acting as a caption or ironic commentary. Either way, Wegman constantly subverts viewer’s expectations by treating word and image as tools to undermine, surprise and induce laughter.
Wegman first gained significant attention as a conceptual artist in Los Angeles at the dawn of the 1970s, and one of the earliest pieces included in the show is the photo Learn To Dance with Modern Electronic Equipment from 1973. The classic photos and videos he created in this period remain revelatory today, but just as surprising and enjoyable are the drawings that he began making that same year. Untitled (1973) shows a wavy music staff that looks like it is dancing to the music, while Cher By Wegman (1975) appears to be just as focused on the artist’s signature as it is on the subject. Homage to 'Albers' (1975) is an unmistakable nod to the Bauhaus master, while Afraid of Yellow (1975) is a possible reference to Willem de Kooning. Classical artists and themes are parodied in vintage 20”x24” Polaroids like Caravaggio (1983), Huddle (2007) and Daisy Nut Ball (1994), a visual twist on Arcimbaldo’s iconic fruit faces. The latter photo features one of Wegman’s famous Weimaraners, who make appearances in a number of other rarely if ever seen large scale Polaroids, including the diptych On and In the Landscape (1988), Underdog (1992) and Framed Portrait (1996).
Wegman returned to painting in 1985 and has since created an expansive body of works that extend his singular vision into dazzling imagistic dimensions. The paintings Gallery Installation (2021) and Paneled Room (2021) are two recent examples of the artists’ remarkable skill and finesse. The latter is a portrait of Philip Guston’s painting The Studio (1969) actually repainted by Wegman but set in a wood paneled room, while the former painting reveals a textural play of different wood boxes that may possibly be shipping crates set up as an art installation. As intricate and striking as they are beautiful and funny, Wegman’s work always possesses a depth that goes far beyond the punchline.
The book William Wegman: Writing by Artist was edited by Andrew Lampert and published in April 2022 by Primary Information. The first collection to focus on Wegman’s lengthy and deeply funny relationship to language, the book is filled with over 300 previously unknown and wildly entertaining texts, drawings, and early photographs spanning the early 1970s to the present.
William Wegman was born in Holyoke, MA, in 1943 and received a BFA from the Massachusetts College of Art, Boston and an MFA from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. His work has been exhibited extensively in both the United States and abroad, including solo exhibitions at the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis (1982); San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (1988); Whitney Museum of American Art (1992); Museum of Fine Arts, Boston (2001); and The Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto (2002). The retrospective William Wegman: Funney/Strange was held at the Brooklyn Museum, and traveled to the Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.; the Norton Museum of Art, Palm Beach; the Addison Gallery of American Art, Andover; and Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus (2006-07). The Bowdoin College Museum of Art presented William Wegman: Hello Nature, a major survey of over 100 nature-related works by the artist in various media (2012), which traveled to Artipelag, Värmdö, Stockholm, Sweden (2013). William Wegman: Improved Photographs, a survey exhibition, was held at the Jepson Center, Telfair Museums, Savannah, GA (2017). In 2018, the Metropolitan Museum of Art organized Before/On/After: William Wegman and California Conceptualism, an exhibition of the early 70s work of Wegman and his fellow Los Angeles artists. The Shelburne Museum organized William Wegman: Outside In, a comprehensive survey in 2019. William Wegman: Being Human, an international touring exhibition of his large-format Polaroids, traveled to venues including Palais de L’Archevêché, Arles; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne; Christchurch Art Gallery, New Zealand; MASI, Lugano; Photomuseum den Haag, The Hague; and Seoul Arts Center, Seoul, Korea (2018-21). Wegman’s work is in many important public collections including Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo; Centre Pompidou, Paris; Los Angeles County Museum of Art; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; The Museum of Modern Art, New York; San Francisco Museum of Modern Art; Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; Whitney Museum of American Art, New York.
