A Portrait Of An Artist With A Young Dog

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

When I first came to Cardiff in 1997 to live with my now wife I decided to also do some voluntary work. Eventually went to help out at a charity shop in Cowbridge Road, Canton but I do remember when looking around noticing an ad to help with the distribution of The Big Issue magazine. For those reading it outside this Disunited Kingdom it's a magazine that the homeless sell in towns and cities.

All seemed interesting and appealing. Until I read a sentence which said something along the lines of:

"Must have an affinity with dogs".

Which for this domestic wolf a phobic like me made me move on.

Was reminded about all of this when reading the latest book I borrowed from the library.

John Dolan - John & George

This 2014 book tells the story of John Dolan who is apparently a critically acclaimed artist. I say "apparently" not out of any snobby way but just because I'm personally very ignorant about art. Unlike Mr Dolan I wasn't good at it at school. Art is the subject where if you don't have the natural talent to start with it's really impossible to improve. When I left school it was a world I just for the most part ignored.

But what this book explains is the journey he took to get where he is at the end of it. And it was not an easy one. Family troubles, crime, imprisonment, drugs and of course homelessness it is laid bare in honest detail.

And with him for part of this difficult journey is "George" a Staffy that becomes his almost by accident. He raises this dog despite the circumstances and he realises that despite their hardships they have a growing bond.

I've said before in this blog that the best animal books are those where animals are not the only factor that drives it and this is certainly the case here. Indeed you could argue that the cover is misleading for whilst George is obviously an important character in the book it is in essence Mr Dolan's autobiography.

I've mentioned it's an honest book. Two other examples needs to be highlighted with regard to his honesty. Firstly the sense that even with George Mr Dolan's life would have probably moved into an even more darker direction if his artistic ability had not been discovered and secondly despite the optimistic end there was a sense that he was not completely out of the woods yet. I was tempted to go online to find out what happened to him these four years later but resisted. I was to be honest scared.

So it's a quietly important book. Indeed as the United Nations explains Britain now is in a worse state with poverty than before it's more relevant now than when it was when published.

Until the next time.