God, am I a juvenile, or what???

I'm enjoying Alex Ross's photo-blogging of the Bayreuth Festival, which is on its third installment. But when he points out that statues of Richard Wagner's dog are all over town, I can't help but think it would be funny to walk around and place one of these behind every one of them.

I mean, I love Wagner's music and all, but statues of his dog?!

UPDATE: Mr. Ross has a bit of new information about the dogs of Wagner. I wasn't so much "alarmed" as "bemused"; I merely assumed that the canine statuary had been in place pretty much since the Wagner festival began, probably as part of Wagner's own dictate as to how the Festival should be run. I don't think that there's much "whimsy" to be found in Wagner -- either in his music or in his character -- which is why I assumed the dogs weren't meant to be whimsical.

But apparently the dogs are meant to be precisely that, and they're a much more recent phenomenon: it's an art project designed to make Wagner more accessible. That being the case, I'm reminded of something that happened in these parts, the Herd About Buffalo. This was a "herd" of life-sized fiberglass bison that were individually decorated by local artists and displayed around Buffalo before being auctioned off, one by one. A lot of local businesses and homeowners ended up buying them, so it's not uncommon to drive around and see this big, stylized fiberglass buffalo sitting on someone's front lawn.

Anyway, thanks to Mr. Ross for the link.