Our Mission

Studio Mission:

Each of us has our own unique gifts and talents. Some of us have hearts that cry for children, for the tigers, the whales, the environment, the homeless.

My heart has always cried for the displaced family pets that, through no fault of their own, suddenly find themselves dumped at a shelter or the pound, without their humans, without familiar surroundings or routines, and who do not know why they are there. Perhaps an elderly owner went into the nursing home and nobody wanted to take in the dog, or the family moved to a place that doesn’t allow pets. Dogs love unconditionally and don’t understand why people abuse or abandon them, whether intentionally or unintentionally.

One of my earliest mentors, a retired pastor, helped me past my self-imposed guilt as to why “donate to the hungry children” commercials didn’t emotionally affect me but a “donate to save the rescued/abused dogs” commercial still upsets me so much I have to walk out of the room. Rev. Carl Luthman said to me: “If everyone was wired to only help children, who would help the elderly? or the elephants? or the environment? Everyone has a different God-given focus to care about so that the entirety of creation has advocates.”

I don’t apologize any more for being a dog advocate. My heart goes out to senior and large-breed dogs, especially those with black fur who for superstitious reasons get overlooked at shelters and euthanized more than any other fur color. I do not discriminate against small dogs or cats, however, as all of the above are here at my studio. Smaller breed and puppies and kittens are just more desirable to adopters than older “used pets.” I simply have a soft spot for the senior displaced ones.

The marketing and communications aspect of my Studio work aims to help both cat and dog rescue groups with large projects or small ones such as helping create, launch and maintain low-cost, high return fundraising through simple monthly auctions that create awareness and interest via social media promotion. A prolific upcycler, I also help beautify items for thrift store re-sale. As an artist, I create pet portraits and memorials as well as surface design items such as fabrics and print-on-demand items tailored to clients and the non-profit organizations I assist.

When I am finally able to create my Dog Benevolence Foundation as a 501(c)(3) charitable organization, it will be for supporting passionate advocacy efforts, especially pertaining to helping to fund veterinary costs to heal rescued animals so they are more easily rejuvenated for adoption. My draft entity is:

Nemo Ryan Memorial Dog Benevolence Foundation (TBD)

Happy dogs are happy because they are part of happy families. Therefore, we strive to reach our studio’s ultimate advocacy goals by attaining one milestone at a time:

• No dog left behind. Promoting adoption of abandoned and rescued dogs, especially seniors and large breeds.

• No dog left at home alone. Promoting the addition of community amenities that allow both dogs and families to participate together.

• No dog put in “time out.” Promoting free dog training activities that not only create good canine behavior, but also increase a dog’s sociability, making him a Good Canine Citizen that his owners feel confident taking him to community events.

• No dog bullied or harmed. Promoting social awareness of anti-cruelty matters and legislation to correct and, if necessary, punish bad human behavior toward dogs.

• All dogs loved. Promoting a culture within each community that values domesticated animals as family members and not merely pets so that the concept of “family” is raised to a higher level of understanding to include all of those living creatures one welcomes into one’s home for the purpose of taking voluntary responsibility for caring for all of those living creatures’ needs until the natural passing of the individual lives of those family members.

Big Black Dog Studio strives to attain our ideal vision of Dog Utopia through practical accomplishments, the combination of which equate to the reaching of great and small milestones in continuously raising the quality of life standard for dogs and their humans.
We work hand-in-hand with those who can create better conditions and lives for the dogs and their families especially as it falls under the above milestone goals.

One day, we hope to see the reality of a true Dog Utopia. Until that day arrives, we will keep on working to be a voice for the furry voiceless.