Gou: The Dog
The eleventh animal in the Chinese zodiac is the dog, denoted by the Chinese characters 'gou'. This original linoleum block print shows a Shar-Pei, or Chinese Fighting Dog, in the grass. The print is limited to an edition of 30. The hand-carved block is inked with environmentally-friendly water-based inks and burnished (also by hand) onto Japanese kozo (or mulberry) paper. The block itself is about 8" by 10.5" (20 cm by 27 cm) and is printed with a wide enough margin for framing.
The Year of the Dog occurs in 1910, 1922, 1934, 1946, 1958, 1970, 1982, 1994, 2006, 2018 and 2030.
Unsurprisingly, people born in the Year of the Dog are reputed to be loyal and reliable. The sort one turns to in a crisis. Dog people are supposed to be honest, intelligent, straightforward, but a bit eccentric.
My brother (the OB) calls my brother (the DJ) "Uncle Gougou" to his bad, black lab puppy Marley. This is a Simpsons reference, as once Milton suggested naming a dog "Puppy Gougou" (which suggests to they knew that gou was Chinese for dog).