Brooklyn photographer Michael Crouser sure has captured the dark side of New York's dog parks. The images are for his new book of photography called Dog Run, and a selection of them will be on display at the Gallery FCB through the month of October. Crouser relayed one story from a dog park to us, in which the pug you'll see in the images is the protagonist.
This little pug kept barking at me, and following me around, so eventually I turned my camera on him...he picked a distance that he liked to bark from, but it was just inches too close for me to focus on him. If I backed away he moved toward me the exact same distance and kept barking. I tried again, and again he moved with me...soon people were laughing at our little dog and camera show as we shuffled across the park. I finally figured out that if I moved toward him he would back away, just into range, so I could get one or two shots before he reestablished his fighting distance. This went on for about five minutes...until I had shot a whole roll of him looking earnestly and protectively and barkingly into the eye of the 300mm alien, which he very obviously didn't care for.
