Best in show
DETOURS | William Wegman's art exhibit at Ohio State University features his latest works as well as those beloved Weimaraners
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- I've been a fan of William Wegman's since the early 1970s when he began shooting the wide-eyed puppy Man Ray.
But like any dog on a long leash, the best things in travel are unexpected.
(Courtesy William Wegman)
* The exhibit features a cell phone tour with commentary from Wegman. The cell phone tour is free -- only incurring the cost of your minutes. Loaner cell phones are available the Patron Services Desk on the entry level. Parking is available in the Ohio Union Parking Garage, just south of the Wexner Center on High Street.
FILM FESTBeginning Thursday and running through Dec. 2, the Wexner hosts the fourth annual Columbus International Children's Film Festival. At 10 a.m. Dec. 1, "Morning Cartoons Go to the Dogs" will feature favorite cartoon pooches from assorted American directors. Kids are encouraged to arrive early for a cereal and pajama party and tour the exhibition afterward. Kids in pajamas receive a surprise with their cereal provided by Whole Foods Market. For more information, call (614) 292-3535 or visit www.wexarts.org.
The warm Polaroids of Weimaraners were my reason for visiting "William Wegman: Funney/Strange," running through Dec. 30 at the Wexner Center for the Arts on the campus of Ohio State University.
However, I wound up embracing Wegman's recent works with ink, thrift-store gouache and vintage postcards on paper. Just like me, Wegman is a pack rat. "Urban Renewal" (2004), his colorful 16-by-84-inch oil on wood collage of vintage postcards from a Milwaukee purification plant, the Fireside Restaurant in Downstate Springfield and other points, delivers the past from the basement into the bright sunshine.
And in a faux Christmas card, Wegman's depiction of preteens "Bob and Ray" stood next to each other chest-to-back in natty bow ties just as my brother and I did when we lived in Columbus. When you look closely at "Bob and Ray" (1996) you see the big lipped painting of the surrealistic artist Man Ray hanging above the fireplace.
Funny and strange.
That's Wegman and it is why Columbus is the perfect location for the traveling exhibition to conclude. The 64-year-old Wegman deploys the same wry Midwestern sense of humor of Johnny Carson, David Letterman and the comedy team of Bob and Ray (although they were from Boston). The Columbus Zoo is celebrating its 80th anniversary (9990 Riverside Dr.; 800-606-5397, open year-round) and zoo Director Emeritus Jack Hannah and Wegman have been guests on Letterman's shows.
Featuring more than 200 pieces, "Funney/Strange" opened in March 2006 at the Brooklyn (N.Y.) Museum of Art, then moved to the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. and the Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach, Fla. "I wanted the retrospective to show the four lines in my work and to give them an equal balance," Wegman said in a conversation from his home in New York City. "That would be paintings, photographs, the videos and simple funny drawings. Each group doesn't dominate, although in people's minds I'm sure the dog is still Wegman."
I was only in Columbus for 24 hours, but funny and strange things always happen to me in the city America is waiting to discover.
After I left the Wexner Center I bumped into Brutus Buckeye, the nutty Ohio State mascot. I learned that by next spring as many as 250 seven-foot-tall Brutus Buckeye fiberglass statues will be on display in the Columbus area. "Brutus On Parade" is modeled after our own "Cows on Parade" and the 2004 program at the University of Iowa featuring mascot Herky Hawkeye. The public art project is part of an effort to raise as much as $1 million toward renovation of the Ohio State University Library. A Woody Hayes Brutus and Christopher Columbus Brutus already have hit the streets around Ohio Stadium. The university is seeking sponsors for future Brutus statues (visit www.brutuson parade.com for more details).
I had dinner at the splendid Northstar cafe (951 N. High St., 614-298-9999, also serves breakfast and lunch), which is known for its organic menu, organically produced Sam Smith beer from the United Kingdom and no-tipping policy. I loved the Northstar's Buddha Bowl (seared tofu with peanut sauce and veggies, $8.90). Owners Katy and Kevin Malhame rely on the abundance of central Ohio organic farmers and producers. Another good sign at the Northstar is the magazine stand on the south end of the restaurant, including copies of Art Forum and the Utne Reader. When I was a kid in Columbus, we lived on North Star Road. (No, we did not have a Weimaraner.)
"Growing up, my mother had a dog named Cindy and I was given a dog named Wags, " Wegman said. "It was a classic beagle-like mutt who lived to be about 20. He would go on my paper route with me."
Wegman's art is good natured. He is a good-natured guy. When I called his house I asked for "Mr. Wegman." He responded as Bill.
Wegman said, "I remember being very awkward in high school and lost the first year of college. I had a hard time having people listen to me. I always wanted attention but I never had the means. I wasn't exactly the class clown because I was too shy. But you could be sneaky funny by rearranging parts of narratives and just see who is listening."
That is what we try to do here at Detours.
"At the same time I remember discovering 'Bob and Ray' and how it might apply to my own work," Wegman said. "I was just starting video. Bob and Ray were so droll so I like to compare myself to them -- although it was a reaffirming affinity rather than something that directly led to what I was doing."
Wegman was born in Holyoke, Mass., and studied painting at the Massachusetts College of Art in Boston. In 1967 he obtained a master's in fine arts at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and then taught for three years at the University of Wisconsin in Madison.
"I had never been to the Midwest," Wegman said. "Champaign put a deep lump in my throat. It was flat. I'm from New England and it was agriphobia inducing. It was an ordeal, but University of Illinois was a wonderful time for me to meet [avant-garde musician] John Cage and connect with the music school. I had a small fellowship in electrical engineering to work with people in the biological computer lab. It sounds 'high-up' but I muddled through that and made some interactive environmental works." Wegman and U. of I. filmmaker Ronald Nameth later traveled to New York to present their electronic/interactive projects at the Electric Circus nightclub where Andy Warhol hung out.
"Work with postcards evolved out of photographs I was compelled to alter in the late 1970s," Wegman explained. "I would take a picture of Man Ray or something else and find something lacking. I would try to subvert the original intention with a mark, a word or an added gesture. Specifically with the postcards I made a book The Field Guide to North American and Other Regions (1993, Lapis Press, and part of the Wexner retrospective in a glass case), a parody on nature guides and scouting books, especially those grounded in the 19th century attitudes with confusion of gender issues: Is a plant a she or a he? So I wallowed around in that realm linguistically and pictorially. I found some postcards from Maine and combined them into my altered photographic modes."
Wegman and his wife divide their time between New York and Maine. They have three Weimaraners -- of course. He installed a new Weimaraner mural specifically for the Wexner Center. The 57-foot-long mural with nine individual photos greets visitors as they enter the bright four-tiered museum. A 2005 renovation included the reopening of a 350-foot skylight with state-of-the-art glass that filters light to protect collections.
Wegman first came to the Wexner Center in the early 1990s to work on a video piece. The 40-year retrospective was finalized but Wegman was persuaded for an encore presentation in Columbus.
The "Funney/Strange" retrospective gets its name from a simple 1982 Wegman drawing of a finger in a nose (funny) paralleled with another finger in a mouth (strange). He still finds independence in drawing after years of working with video and electronics.
"It was great to be sitting with typing paper and a No. 2 pencil and you could make something that could rattle things up," Wegman said. "I also can't tell you how many electric shocks I got trying to wire things together during my University of Illinois experiences. Drawings didn't have to be stylistic, they could be so simple you would know what I was talking about. I was seeking clarity more than complication. You didn't need to have a complete knowledge of Western art in the 20th century to know what step I was making because I wasn't making a step that was a comment on the previous academy." So it is natural to make steps to Columbus to check out Wegman's retrospective. You'll get it, kids will get it and there's nothing strange about that."