The domestication of dogs is a story of power, control, and co-evolution over thousands of years. Research suggests humans first domesticated wolves as far back as 15,000–40,000 years ago, gradually moulding a fierce predator into a loyal companion. The very term pedigree denotes a recorded purity of lineage – an ancestral record meticulously engineered by human hands. Through selective breeding and training, people have transformed wolves into pampered pets, even fluffy toys made for our comfort and entertainment. Yet this manipulation of canine nature reveals as much about human nature as it does about dogs. Our desire to tame, shape, and command these animals exposes an animalistic impulse within ourselves – a primal need to dominate and redefine nature to suit our whims.

In this exhibition eighteen contemporary artists explore this fraught human–dog relationship, probing the fine line between nurture and cruelty, instinct and indoctrination. As Arthur Conan Doyle quipped through Sherlock Holmes, “A dog reflects the family life… Snarling people have snarling dogs, dangerous people have dangerous ones.” When a dog turns violent, it not only expresses its own animal instincts but also mirrors the aggression and fear conditioned by its human trainers. David Cooper’s assemblages, for instance, channel “momentary absences of restraint” – fragments of disorder that echo an unleashed canine instinct suddenly breaking free of control. Similarly, Nicola Hicks’s formidable sculptures of anthropomorphic beasts blur the line between human and animal, exuding both raw power and pathos. Hicks’s practice of humanizing animal forms lays bare darker content: her monumental half-creature figures confront us with the beastly traits lurking in human nature, while also exposing the fragility imposed by our attempts to civilize the wild.

Other artists turn a critical eye toward the aesthetics of domestication – the ways we physically refashion animals in our image. Over centuries, purebred dogs have been sculpted into unnatural shapes, their bodies contorted to satisfy human standards of beauty and status. As some critics note, this “improvement” in look often imposes suffering on the animal, “not an improvement; it is torture.” Irena Posner’s works tackle such power imbalances head-on, delving into selective breeding and fetish to expose how the quest for pedigree can become a cruel performance of dominance.

In a similarly provocative vein, Tulani Hlalo draws on the niche subculture of extreme competitive dog grooming – dyeing and sculpting dogs’ fur into outrageous designs – as a visual language for identity. Her playful yet biting approach asks how our own identities are coiffed and tamed by societal norms, much as show-dogs are groomed into caricatures of canine perfection. Meanwhile, painter David Surman engages with the saccharine side of human control: his exuberant, pop-inflected paintings embrace cuteness and cartoon aesthetics, highlighting how we breed and depict dogs to amplify their most endearing, childlike traits. Surman’s work subtly underscores the absurdity and poignancy in this cult of cute – the way we infuse animals with exaggerated innocence as a means of controlling them emotionally.