WALL STREET—You don’t need a street photographer to tell you that you can learn a lot about people from their pets. But I can tell you that folks who would never consent to be photographed on the street are often overjoyed when you photograph their dog. And while a decent journalist should always have a straight-forward approach, sometimes you can’t get the best picture of something by looking directly at it.
Lucky for me, some sort of dog training session is taking place downtown. I follow a herd of leashed dogs and their owners, but after a few blocks I realize these dogs are all well groomed, well behaved, civilized pets. In other words, they’ve been trained to control their impulses and hide their motives. Just like people.
So I veer away. At Pack Square I find hippies. A scantily-clad girl dances in the warmth of the evening as her companions look on. One of them plays guitar, its case open for donations at his feet. The others stand and watch, and around the shoulders of one dread-locked individual is draped a gray cat. At the group’s feet, dogs watch impatiently.
Back in front of the Flatiron Building, I spot a dog whose fur has been shaved into a mohawk. His owner agrees to let me get a picture, but for some reason insists on holding his own tongue out, like a dog might do on a hot day. In Pritchard Park I meet a man who says his dog rides behind him on his motorcycle.
These photos follow, along with others I’ve collected in the past few years:
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Other dispatches from the Asheville Argus:
The Leader
The Asylum
Signs
The Lay of the Land
Merry Christmas from the Asheville Argus
Myopia
Crying Wolf
Birds, Part II
Birds, Part I
Eyes on the Street
The Public Space
Collected Street Portraits
The Day it All Started
Fog on the Top Deck
Two Storms
Introducing the Asheville Argus
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