The ultimate collection of William Wegman’s Weimaraner photographs, in an accessibly priced format, with over 250 brilliant and witty images from across five decades.

All artists have a muse. Movie directors perfect their craft working again and again with the same actor, while choreographers find their inspiration for some of their greatest works when creating for a particular dancer. Sometimes a muse is a silent partner, the object of an artist's intense and obsessive gaze. At other times the relationship is a kind of performance, a deeply collaborative act. For William Wegman, whose muses have been all of these things and more over the years, inspiration arrived in 1970 when his dog, a Weimaraner named Man Ray, appeared in front of his camera.

William Wegman is a world-renowned American artist whose paintings, photographs, videos and drawings have been exhibited in museums and galleries internationally. Today he is perhaps best known for his collaborations with his longstanding muses, an ever-expanding cast of Weimaraners, for whom performing elaborate scenarios or merely posing demurely for their portraits comes as second nature. Curated in close collaboration with distinguished photography author William A. Ewing, William Wegman: Being Human is the most extensive collection of Wegman’s photographic work yet to be published. With over 300 images made over the last four decades, many published here for the first time, Being Human will delight and engage both those who are new to Wegman’s work and those who have admired his art for many years.

The book is organized thematically, presenting a wealth of exceptional work in such a way as to highlight the versatility of Wegman’s ever-inventive mind as he explores what it means to be human. From portraits of characters we so easily recognize – a suburban housewife, a famous actor, a nightclub singer, a golfer dressed in plaid – to imagery that toys with a wide range of visual languages, Wegman quotes freely from fashion photography, Cubism, colour theory, the tradition of the nude and the history of art itself.

With insightful essays by Ewing and Wegman, and an interview that explores the key concepts of the book, Wegman’s approach to his subjects and their life in the studio, Being Human celebrates a creative partnership - a relationship between an artist and his muses - that continues to this day.

For more than 25 years, artist William Wegman (b. 1943) has been making brilliant and inventive photographs with the 20 x 24" Polaroid camera. In 1979, when Polaroid invited Wegman to try out this enormous camera, he began a series of photographs featuring his dog, Man Ray, initiating a remarkable collaboration. After Man Ray died in 1982, Wegman continued his exploration of the medium with non-canine subjects and, later, with the dog Fay Ray and an expanding universe of her progeny.

Now published as a reduced-format paperback, William Wegman Polaroids gathers together the best of this work - hundreds of unique, large-format photographs - with an insightful essay by the artist exploring his experiences with the camera and his exceptional models. The book is not only a comprehensive survey but also a record of sustained artistic creativity and loving appreciation of the canine form that is bound to enchant a new generation of readers in this charming new format.

About the Author:

William Wegman’s photographs, videotapes, paintings, and drawings have been exhibited in museums and galleries around the world. Beginning in 1990, a retrospective of his work traveled to museums throughout Europe and the United States. His work has been the subject of the Abrams titles Man’s Best Friend, William Wegman, and William Wegman: Fashion Photographs. Wegman has also produced numerous popular children’s books and created film and video works for Sesame Street, Saturday Night Live, and other programs.