"Images of dogs in the desert captured in the midst of running wildly after the car. Emphasising the grain of the image, these black and white photographs capture a haunting moment in which there is a duality between a sense of absence and presence. The behaviour of the dogs suggests a lack of previous stimuli, a loneliness, at the same time as an all-consuming reaction to the now, a presence."

A family capturing the beauty of their photogenic dog.

A family struggling with one of the biggest mysteries in photography: How to shoot my black dog?

Roaming the natural and urban world with a camera for over 16 years, often alone, on foot, keeping a low profile, Ed Panar has repeatedly been caught in the act of photography—not by other people, but by a random assortment of familiar animals: cows, cats, frogs, dogs, turtles, deer, geese…you name it. The animal sees Ed, and Ed sees the animal; an unspoken communication passes between them. If he’s lucky, the moment is captured on film, catalogued, tagged for future reference. In Animals That Saw Me: Volume One Panar brings together the first collection of his most surprising and unexpected encounters with ordinary fauna—a brief, deadpan field study of the uncanny moment of recognition between species. What exactly have the animals seen? The pictures are a reminder that we must appear as strange and exotic to them as they do to us.

For years Daniel Naudé has traversed South Africa’s countryside recording his travels as a way of understanding South Africa and its complexities. Among his most arresting subjects are animals, and the collection of images in this book is as beautiful as it is intriguing. The penetrating stare of a feral Africanis dog; the regal dignity of enormous horned cattle; farmers bottle-feeding a lamb, clutching a young donkey, or stolidly leading their goats to pasture—all are photographed against the backdrop of South Africa’s rolling hills, grasslands, and seashore. As Naudé’s muted colors contrast with the animals’ stark silhouettes, viewers are compelled to share his intrepid curiosity about the nature of human dominion over animals, and about how the histories of all living things are intertwined and indivisible.

Synonymous with Jack London’s literaryclassic also entitled ‘White Fang’, Motoki’s photographs portraying the dog fighting or “Inu AI” (Dog Meeting) tradition in the northern prefecture of Aomori captures both the nature and relationship between owner and animal as well as the battle between the animals themselves. Motoki's self publishedWhite Fangtells the history of this tradition, how it began and how it has changed within society from post-war japan up until today, balancing both the cultural sensitivities towards dog fights with the pride, honor and tradition in which the fights are carried out. Here the images are stark and compelling, beautifully managing to encapsulate environment and landscapewithin the hand bound publication complete with illustrative insets, utilizing portraiture in capturing man and animal along the visual narratives of the timeless binaries of nature vs nurture , wild vs tamed.

“A dog fight was held in Aomori in January 2014. Aomori is a snowy area, located at the northern part of Japan. Well trained dogs, the pride and joy of their owners, were brought to the battlefield early in the morning. The dogs seemed to fight on instinct, as if it was their destiny.”

Every winter throughout Spain it is estimated that up to 100,000 hunting dogs are abandoned or killed at the end of the hare-coursing season when they are no longer needed, perform badly or are too old. This book documents those dogs that have been rescued and sets them against the locations in Spain where they are typically abandoned: the sides of roads, the ravines, the rivers, the edges of towns, and the empty car parks. Shot in a style that references the tone and mood of Velázquez who painted at a time when these dogs were treated with great respect, Martin Usborne's photographs show both the classical beauty of the animals but also the ugliness of their modern situation – their bodies are weakened, their expressions fearful. The dogs in these pictures are the fortunate ones – they have found a place to rest and recuperate. The landscapes bear testament to those less fortunate animals who find a different kind of rest beside the roads, in the rivers, or out in the open plains.

Following his successful book The Silence of Dogs in Cars (Kehrer 2012) Martin Usborne again presents unusual and moving portraits of dogs.

Animals That Saw Me: Volume Two pairs a new collection of photographs from the observational wanderings of Ed Panar with an original essay on “being seen” by speculative realist philosopher Timothy Morton. Extending the project Panar began in 2011 with Animals That Saw Me: Volume One, this ‘sequel’ draws from recent work and newly discovered gems from his vast back catalogue to depict a series of brief, shared encounters with various (non-human) species — mammal, reptile, bird, insect — as they seem to behold the (human) photographer. Edited for the viewer’s maximum delight, the pictures embody a whimsical concept with surprisingly complex ramifications under the surface. Why do we distinguish between “us” and “them,” and what exists in the space between these distinctions? What does it mean to make “eye contact” with another species? What does the presence of a camera add to this phenomenon? Channeling the thoughtful humor, wonder and peculiar engagement with the world that made Panar’s first volume an instant hit, this volume revisits and digs deeper into the question: “Why do we assume that it’s only us who does the looking?”

Lous Martens about the book: "Seventeen years ago our grandson Jaap was born. That was the start of an animal book for Jaap. I used a dummy for the OASE journal of architecture and loosely pasted in pictures of animals that I had clipped from newspapers and magazines about art, literature and science. Plus stamps and photos from advertising brochures. Then Zeno was born and the same thing happened: an animal book for Zeno. Now I was working on two books at once. Then came Anna. Julian. Luca. At this point, there were five books-in-the-making on the table. And none of those five are finished yet. The children, as well as myself, enjoy seeing the small, ever-evolving changes. The additions. These books were never intended for the outside world where I had found all the pictures. Never intended to be published. Now they lie here, grouped into one big book, because others have convinced me it's what they deserve."

Fallschirmspringende Hunde, ferngesteuerte Haie, Raketen, die von Tauben gelenkt werden, Katzen mit implantierten Abhörgeräten : In diesem Buch geht es um Tiere, die der Mensch zu Kriegsteilnehmern gemacht hat. Die militärische Nutzung von Tieren spielt seit Anbeginn der Kriegsgeschichte eine entscheidende Rolle. Tiere sind ständige Wegbegleiter, jedoch keineswegs ebenbürtige Partner der Menschen. 32 erstaunliche, skurrile und bizarre Tiersoldaten dieses Buches zeigen, dass der Mensch keine Grenzen kennt, wenn es darum geht, sich gegenüber dem Feind einen Vorteil zu verschaffen. Woher kommt die Selbstsicherheit, mit der der Mensch sich die Fähigkeiten der Tiere zunutze macht ? Welche Konsequenzen hat das für Mensch und Tier, und wie und warum gerät der Vormachtsglaube der Menschen gerade zu Kriegszeiten ins Wanken?

"Humpelfuchs" is a self-published book, about a nightly encounter with a limping fox in Bastian Thiery's neighborhood.

In "Animal Greetings from the UK", all images have been collected and extracted by Alberto Vieceli from eighty vintage postcards from the United Kingdom. This kind of postcards, that were in use between the 40s and 60s, were in the middle of the postcard cards always decorated with animal photos, mostly cats and dogs.

Sage Sohier grew up with four dogs, and currently lives with three. Animals have always been important in her life; so, when she started photographing people in the late 1970s, she often included their companion animals.

“There is more spontaneity, less self-consciousness, and more chaos when humans and other animals coexist. Love is unconditional, grief is uncomplicated though deeply felt, and life is richer, more vivid, more comical.”

Howling Winds is the fifth chapter of Vasantha Yogananthan’s long-term project A Myth of Two Souls, which offers a contemporary retelling of The Ramayana. A seven-chapter tale first recorded by the Sanskrit poet Valmiki around 300 BC, The Ramayana is one of the founding epics of Hindu mythology and has been continuously rewritten and reinterpreted through time.

Since 2013, Yogananthan has been travelling from north to south India to Sri Lanka, retracing the itinerary of the epic’s heroes. Between fiction and reality, he deliberately blurs the lines through multiple aesthetic approaches.

At the end of chapter 4, the wicked Ravana abducts Princess Sita. While Rama is in great distress, hundreds of thousands of animals from all around the world gather to search for Sita. They know that on the far shore of the ocean is the bright and shining island of Lanka, where Ravana is living.

Shot along the coastlines of Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka, Howling Winds mixes classic color photographs with acrylic hand-painted photographs to echo a world of magic.