Artist Emilie Gossiaux’s recent fellowship at the Queens Museum resulted in an art installation centered on her guide dog, London. Three Londons, in fact, dancing around a maypole. The maypole is actually a 15-foot-tall white cane, a symbol of how she regained freedom following an accident that caused her to lose her eyesight.

Her artwork since then has often focused on London, her 13-year-old Labrador guide — and more broadly, on removing barriers between animals and humans and celebrating their partnership and mutual dependency.

The Queens Museum exhibit, while Gossiaux’s first solo museum exhibit, is not London’s first starring role in her art. Gossiaux told the New York Times that her work featuring London has been influenced by the writer and scholar Donna Haraway, who examined relationships between humans and non-humans in multiple works, including The Companion Species Manifesto.

In addition to the human-adult-sized dancing Londons, Gossiaux has created other sculptures and drawings focusing on other aspects of her life with London and of other interspecies relationships.

Other Worlding is on exhibit at the Queens Museum until April 7, 2024. If you’re lucky enough to be in New York before then — and can arrange to visit the museum — let me know what you thought!