Artist Statement

Employing both singular figurative studies and vignette compilations, this series of colour pencil drawings considers the false dichotomy of virtue and vice as presented through a dog’s place in the home: his interactions with ‘his people’ and how we, as both guardian and keeper, regard his nature in relations to our own.

In Lord Byron’s “Epitaph to a Dog” (the poem that initially inspired this series), his dog Boatswain is lauded for having possessed “all the virtues of man without his vices”.

But are our beloved pets truly without vice? What virtues do dogs possess that man does not? Like two sides of the same coin, the virtues graced by Laszlo, a clever and complicated 7 year old Blue Heeler, would be seen as shortcomings if he were man. His unflinching trust would be discredited as blind obedience; his protectiveness as aggression; his powerful devotion as obsession; and his instinct for ultimate survival as indentured dependence.

Laszlo’s laser-sharp focus to achieve his singular goal is what extracts the sin from the behaviour and reveals the newly polished virtue. Obsession becomes playfulness, aggression becomes protection and dominance becomes bravery. These same qualities that would discredit our neighbours and bear down on us to seek forgiveness, raise the stature of our canine companions as they teach us that no vice is completely devoid of virtue.