‘Jackson Pup-lock’ and ‘Vincent Van Dogh’: Art exhibition aims to delight dogs and their owners

A new art exhibition is wagging tails and getting plenty of sniffs.

Pup Culture has been created especially for dogs (and their humans) at the Huia Lodge Discovery Hub in Cornwall Park in Auckland.

The exhibition forms part of Cornwall Park’s seasonal temporary exhibition programme and includes an outdoor scent trail, dog-friendly artworks designed in the canine colour spectrum, scented elements for extra enrichment, and a stick library.

Artworks by Cornwall Park’s own farm dogs also feature, in what is believed to be the first exhibition of its kind for dogs in the country.

Pieces inspired by art world greats such as Richard Kil-lead, Jackson Pup-lock, and Vincent Van Dogh, provide a tail-wagging tribute to contemporary art history. 

Visitor Experience Manager Elise Goodge told The Wag the four works inspired by well known artists were photographs from the park that had been adapted to look more like an artwork- and put in the dog colour spectrum.

“Dogs don’t have the same colour spectrum as we do, they see a lot more in blues and yellows and times of grey and browns, so contrast is not quite so severe for them.

“But also they see everything slightly blurry, so their world is slightly blurrier than our world,” she said.

The works are placed at dog height and each work has also been scented.

“Dogs are sort of nose first, so if something is centred, they’re more likely to engage with it.”

She said Pup Culture was a way of showing owners of animals as well, how their animal experiences the world and how it differs from the way we do.

The exhibition also provided a fun way of getting the message out to dog owners about the rules for enjoying the park.

“We love dogs coming to visit the park, but we do need people to keep their dogs on a lead while they’re here, so we wanted to get that message across in a really fun and interactive way.

“Often when you’re having to police dogs on lead, it seems like it’s coming from a negative space of us policing that. In actual fact, we really love dogs and we wanted everybody to know that and the fact that we’re asking to put their dogs on a lead because we care about their dogs and we want to keep them safe.

“So we thought this was a really fun way to engage people to come to the park with their dogs, enjoy the park, enjoy the park with their dogs on a lead and have a really unique experience in the park,” she said.

A feature of the exhibition is originally artworks by the farm dogs who work on the land at Cornwall Park, which operates as a working farm. 

“They’re important members of our Cornwall Park team and family and they have very important jobs to do here in the park and they’re very special as well because unlike other farm dogs, not only do they have to be good working dogs, but they also have to be friendly because so many members of the public love to engage with them, ” she told The Wag.

The artwork was created by putting paint on the canvases in the dog color spectrum which are the blues, grays, whites, yellows and browns and then put a plastic bag over the canvas and then peanut butter on the plastic bag.

“So what you’re seeing is actually an artwork created using the dog’s tongue.

“What was really interesting for us, which we didn’t anticipate, was that the farm dogs have never actually eaten peanut butter before, so they were a little bit unsure if they liked peanut butter or not.

“Some of them really took to it, some of them didn’t like peanut butter, so you can kind of see that reflected in the artworks a little bit, but it was a lot of fun to create”.

Meanwhile in a new development, a ‘feline intervention’ has stolen a little of the spotlight after a new artwork appeared on the wall this week.

Titled Com-meow-edian, the banana dog toy and duct tape work is boldly attributed to off-lead feline provocateur Maurizio Cat-telan.

The work replicates the famous conceptual art work  Comedian by the Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan, which appears as a fresh banana duct-taped to a wall

Is it a cat-astrophe, or the purr-fect addition? 

“We do actually have people bring their cats to the park to visit the park, especially a park with dwellers in Central Auckland, whose cats don’t have an outdoor area.

“So just like dogs, if you bring your cat to the park, please keep it on the lead, mostly to protect our bird life as well, as we do have a lot of ground dwelling and ground resting birds in the park”, she said.

The rest of the exhibition remains very much one for the dogs. 

Pup Culture is open daily at Huia Lodge Discovery Hub until 1 March.