PETS & THE CITY

Pets & the City examines the visual history of New Yorkers and their animal companions over the past 250 years. For the exhibition, I commissioned illustrator Julia Rothman to depict pets from the New York Historical’s collections navigating the city. Originally created for promotional materials and merchandise, these illustrations were later integrated by the Exhibitions team into the gallery itself.

THE NEW YORK HISTORICAL

CREDITS
Curator: Roberta J.M. Olson
Illustrator: Julia Rothman
Communications Manager: Emily Haight
Exhibition Graphic Designer: Marcela Gonzalez 
Exhibition Designer: Claudia Lynn
Photographer: Zhen Qin

PRESS
The New York Times
The Wall Street Journal
TimeOut
Untapped New York

THE STATUE PETS

Welcoming visitors to The New York Historical are bronze statues of Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass. When thinking about creative ways to engage the statues, I discovered that both men had loyal dogs: Lincoln’s Fido and Douglass’s Frank. We invited illustrator Julia Rothman to bring them to life, and I collaborated with a production company to create life-sized metal cutouts that stood beside the statues for the duration of the exhibition—a playful reminder that even towering figures of history cherished their pets.

MERCHANDISE

I transformed Rothman’s illustrations into custom compositions for NYHistory Store merchandise, including notebooks, mugs, tea towels, leashes, collars, magnets, posters, calendars, and a dog bandana. Every design was developed to engage different audiences—pet owners and lifelong New Yorkers alike.