A Handbook for Dog Walkers

 

"It's about a small dog called Q that I met when I was in between 'real' jobs. Having lots of free time, I started to look after my friend's dog. It didn't take long before I started photographing him, often placing him on various kinds of pedestals. Q would be always eager to pose, it almost seemed like he was waiting to be photographed."

 

A Handbook Dog Walkers by Tomáš Werner is selected from a series of over 100 photographs of a small dog called ‘Q’ taken in Miami over a period of two months last autumn.

 

Werner uses the fading elegance of Art Deco Miami as his ready-made, outdoor studio. The only prop, the tiny dog ‘Q’, is perched atop of fountains, pipes, letterboxes, sculptures and plinths. The backdrops are varied but the stylised painted buildings and the consistent Florida sun add a uniformity to the images, which become a typological study of the smaller details Floridian architecture and urban environment. The focus of all of the images is the dog, ‘Q’, a four year-old Pomeranian. A breed popularised by royal owners such as Queen Victoria, its size has been breed down to less than fifty percent of its original size – artificially evolved to be the perfect size for Werner’s project.