Raymond Merritt, a lawyer by trade, is both an expert on photography and a fan of dogs. So when he was asked to write and co-edit, with Miles Barth, a collection of photography that focused on dogs, it seemed a natural way to combine his passions. A Thousand Hounds (Taschen) is the result. “It’s not […]
Sometimes a dog is just a dog! Artist Eric Fischl explains.
Noted New York City sculptor and painter, Eric Fischl, clad in jeans and a T-shirt, sits in the center of his SoHo studio, smoking a cigar. It is a spacious room filled with hunched-over sculptures, framed paintings and a broad, mounted canvas offering a voyeur’s-eye-view of a couple having sex. Smoke floats up and dissipates. […]
Vanity in Washington. By Peggy van Hulsteyn
Vanity is back! The purring protagonist of Diary of a Santa Fe Cat rears her purrty head again,this time in our nation’s fair capital. There she rubs elbows with democats, republicats, and even kings; braves the hazards of D.C. traffic; and curates the Famous Cats in History show at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. On a sabbatical in D.C. with her human […]
Dark Horses and Black Beauties: Animals, Women, a Passion. By Melissa Holbrook Pierson
The poor horse. Not only have we abused his stoic power and gravely misunderstood his gentle spirit,but even those writers who revere him have all too often failed him by churning out syrupy, superficial accounts of the bond between a girl and her horse. Yet in Dark Horses and Black Beauties, Melissa Holbrook Pierson boldly grabs hold of a threadbare theme and elevates the […]
You Have a Visitor: Observations on Pet Visitation and Therapy, by Renee Lamm Esordi
You have a visitor. For nursing home residents and hospital patients, those four words are enough to send a sublime chill of anticipation down the spine. That’s to say nothing of the spiritual healing and emotional reawakening the patients experience when the door opens and the four-legged therapist actually steps into the room. In this aptly titled book, photographer Renee Lamm Esordi provides […]
On the Road Again with Man’s Best Friend, by Dawn and Robert Habgood
To say that what we have here is a comprehensive guide to hotels that welcome pets would be a considerable understatement. At 888 pages, this travel tome weighs in as the leading authority on hitting the high and dusty trail with your loyal and trusty pal. The Habgoods, who also wrote several best-selling regional guides on the same subject, have done their homework as […]