You May Now Kiss the Dog

You May Now Kiss the Dog

Participatory Speculative Ceremony

You May Now Kiss the Dog imagines a covenant ceremony between a human and a dog, modelled on the liturgical structure of a Christian wedding. The project is grounded in field research conducted within London’s pet-related industries and communities.

The research outcomes are presented in the publication DOGLOOK CALENDAR, which documents and examines how human society interprets and constructs relationships with non-human companions.

By extending anthropomorphism into a performative exploration of cross-species intimacy, the project investigates how ritual, symbolism, and cultural narratives shape relationships between human and non-human lives.

2025 DOGLOOK CALENDAR

This calendar, based on twelve days of field observation, documents how dogs participate in and co-construct life within human-shaped frameworks while exploring the complex relationships between humans and dogs.

It focuses on how humans interpret, construct, and shape narratives around non-human lives, and reflects on how to acknowledge the existence of the Other in multispecies interactions.

You May Now Kiss the Dog

This project imagines a covenant ceremony between a human and a dog, constructed through the liturgical structure of a Christian wedding. Emerging from field research within London’s pet-related industries and communities, the project extends anthropomorphism into a speculative mode of cross-species intimacy.

Through the unfolding of this imagined covenant ceremony, the work reveals an emergent social imagination in which human–animal relationships are continuously rewritten through culture, emotion, and everyday practice. Religion operates here not as belief but as a symbolic and performative space — an invitation for audiences to sense, reflect upon, or reimagine the ethical, emotional, and affective bonds between human and non-human lives.