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Mark Johnstone

CanumMemoria, Canum Pictura, Canum Summa Summarum

Four Images on Wall:

(3 framed, one pinned directly to wall) left to right: PAL 1958 - 1971 TOR Feb - July 1975 ARGUS 1975 -1990 KIKO 1990

Text in image on left-hand side of triptych:

Man loves the dog, but how much more ought he to love it, if he considered, in the inflexible harmony of the law of nature, the sole exception, which is that love of a being that succeeds in piercing, in order to draw close to us, the partitions every elsewhere impermeable, that separate the species. We are alone, absolutely alone, on this chance planet, and, amid all the forms of life that surround us, not one, excepting the dog, has made an alliance with us.

Maurice Maeterlinck, "On the Death of a Little Dog:, from The DoubleGarden, translated by Alexander Teixeira de Mattos, London: George Allen & Co., Ltd, 1904

Text on tags:

"The more I see of men, the more l like dogs", (author unidentified)

"Every dog is entitled to one bite" (English proverb, XIX century)

"The best thing about man is the dog" (Buyrette de Bulloy, c.1767)

"The dog teaches thee humility" (John Horneck, 1686)

"Every dog has his day" (English proverb borrowed from the Greek, XVI century)

"There is no dog so bad but he will wag his tail" (Itlaian proverb)

"Dogs bark at people they do not know" (Herecleitus, c. BC 500)

"Your dog is your only philosopher" (Plato, c. BC 375)

"Beware the Dog" (Aristophanes, c. BC 412)