Dogs of the White City
The assignment, in typography class, was to design a field guide. I designed a field guide for Tel Avivian dogs and their owners. Over the course of three months, I explored the streets of Tel Aviv with my camera and documented 36 dogs and their owners. Each photograph is accompanied by the details of the meeting and a short paragraph about the story of the dog and its owner. Next to each story, there is a gray insert containing scientific information about the dog’s breed. The book is composed of all of the classic components of a field guide: small and large title pages, table of contents, preface, introductory essay by Georg Simmel on the psychologicial effects of urban life on the modern individual, a title page for each chapter with a song about Tel Aviv, index, and a colophon. The book is divided into four chapters, based on the time of the walk (morning, midday, evening, and night). I was influenced by the familiar aesthetics of Tel Aviv -Bauhaus, the beach, Mediterranean atmosphere and I chose to design the guide in a minimalist and systematic fashion. The project was an opportunity to interact with individuals who live in my own city, but who I would not otherwise meet. The book highlights the dissonance between the power of individuality on the one hand and the isolation of urban life on the other.