Stuart Collection: William Wegman - La Jolla Vista View

The long-awaited compendium of Wegman's hilarious, ingenious writings and language-centric art, from the early 1970s to the present While he's famous the world over for his instantly recognizable images of Weimaraner dogs, William Wegman has long been one of Conceptual art's true innovators. Filled with previously unknown and wildly entertaining texts, drawings and early photos, Writing by Artist is the first collection to focus on Wegman's longstanding and deeply funny relationship to language. This career-spanning edition presents a thematically organized selection of rediscovered writings dating back to the 1970s and 1980s, alongside landmark early photographs and hilarious drawings from throughout his career. All of the works brilliantly incorporate words in one form or another, altering logic and pushing the boundaries of what artist writing can be. Writing by Artist serves as a genuine epiphany for those only familiar with his later work, and a welcome reminder of his madcap inventiveness for the already enlightened. What you do or don't know about William Wegman now conveniently fits into this strangely beguiling book.

A comprehensive and intriguing look at the witty and sophisticated art of William Wegman, beloved by the general public and held in critical esteem within the international art world This fascinating book reveals the full range of William Wegman's art. Beloved by the general public for signature photographs of his troupe of Weimaraners, Wegman is also an immensely important figure in the contemporary art world. A pioneer video-maker, conceptualist, performer, photographer, painter, draftsman, and writer, Wegman moves fluidly among various media: from conceptual works to commissioned magazine shots; from videos shown in museums to television segments made for Sesame Street and Saturday Night Live; from artist's books parodying nineteenth-century naturalist studies to children's books revealing tongue-in-cheek portraits of town and country life;  from photographic "landscapes" employing his canine muses to his most recent cycle of landscapes combining found scenic souvenir postcards with drawing, collage, and painting. Underlying all his creations is the light humor of "funny" mediating the darker human comedy of "strange." Speaking to the absurdities of daily life.

William Wegman talks about the creation of La Jolla vista view, his project for the Stuart Collection