Balls for Dogs

tennis balls, cardboard

2019

Balls for Dogs was inspired primarily by ideas set forth in the Marshmallow Experiment dealing with delayed gratification, more visually by pyramid schemes, and by certain tenets of capitalism. The former involved a child allowed to take one marshmallow from a bag immediately or two marshmallows if the child had the restraint to wait for ten minutes before taking any. The latter situates Balls for Dogs as a microcosmic test of capitalism’s lures to take more than one needs or to become leery of something offered benevolently for free (for it upends capitalism’s order). The piece takes the playful form of an interactive community ethics installation. Are humans more capricious animals or advanced community members who play fair and defy our primal instincts, restrained or selfish in our need for gratification? It might also be viewed as a tribute to man’s relationship with animals as it relates to fair play. A dialogue of trust vs. suspicion between the provider and potential community recipient and a tribute to the relationship between humans and dogs.