"I don't need one thing, but two things. Two unrelated things that I put together in order to create, by contrast, a sort of plastic poetry.", Man Ray [1]

The Best of William Wegman is a compilation of videos chosen by Wegman himself in 1981, a collection of the artist's most famous comic works and a retrospective of his daily meandering. Wegman's material is always made up of the objects around him: a chair that becomes a massage chair in a deadpan teleshopping parody (Massage Chair); two lamps in Randy's Sick, or a piece of iron thread (Crooked Stick), all produced with minimal sets.
There are studio briefings, as if Wegman was showing us what goes on in the studio during the break, as the artist relaxes, by filming small strange ideas. Wegman makes his stomach sing (Stomach Song) or films a close-up of his mouth in Bad Movies, with one person miming two distinct voices. He also films his dog, Man Ray, running backwards and forwards, following the movements of his master (Pocket Book Man) or carefully following what we imagine is a ball, off-screen, in the company of a canine double whose perfect resemblance to Man Ray results in a cut and paste effect (Dog Duet). Wegman cleverly creates unexpected moments of absurd humour, creating stories from objects and sparks of fiction often accompanied by his voice in voiceover – falling within a certain Surrealist tradition of free association.
The selection comprises the following episodes:
Milk/Floor, Stomach Song, Randy's Sick, Pocket Book Man, Anet and Abtu (Text from Luis Borges, Book of Imaginary Beings), Out and In, Rage and Depression, Massage Chair, Crooked Finger, Crooked Stick, Deodorant, Growl, Spelling Lesson, Drinking Milk, Dog Duet, Starter, Bad Movies, House for sale, Baseball Over Horseshoes, Dog baseball.

Manon Schwich
Translated by Jo Garden

[1]cité par Joan Simon (dir.),"Eureka 1970-1978" in William Wegman: Funney/Strange, Yale University Press, 2006, p.23.