Regardless of how you feel about galleries, it's the purr-fect art exhibition for animal lovers.
Cats and Dogs at the National Gallery of Victoria delineates the animal divide in a very literal way - on one wall there's art with cattitude, while the opposite side of the gallery has gone to the dogs.
"We wanted that conflict, well, not conflict... but that healthy rivalry," said NGV international art curator Laurie Benson.
Benson carries an image of his all-time favourite pet feline Byron (named for the poet) on his security lanyard, and showed off a picture of his two glaring moggies Sirocco and Madison.
"Every half hour before dinner my partner and I get that, it is literally a death stare," he told AAP.
Applying an intense gaze to the exhibition reveals the biggest names in the art world were inspired by our furry friends, from Rembrandt to Goya and Dürer, to Pierre Bonnard, David Hockney and Jeff Koons, and Australians Charles Blackman, Grace Cossington Smith and Nora Heysen.
Benson's co-curator Imogen Mallia-Valjan, the owner of a 10-year-old rescue greyhound named Stipe, may be on the opposing side of the cat/dog divide, but both agree it's a show the public will love.
"I think it'll get in a whole different range of people who love art, who maybe aren't that sure about what art entails in a gallery, but love cats and dogs," she said.
It might seem an unserious subject for an institutional gallery exhibition, but through the 250 works on show, it turns out art has much to say about how working dogs became lapdogs, and how cats became domesticated and then went on to enter the realm of the gods as Divine Felines.
Religious art featuring dogs suggests congregations should emulate their devoted natures, while an Albrecht Dürer engraving of Adam and Eve shows a cat on the scene of the forbidden fruit, secretly waiting for its chance to chase a mouse as soon as humanity falls into sin.
Many artworks will be instantly recognisable, among them Alexandre Steinlen's iconic 1896 art nouveau poster Chat Noir, originally a night club advertisement for the Black Cat cafe in Paris, and a recent acquisition for the gallery.
There's some of the earliest cartoon merchandising in the shape of a papier mache Felix the Cat - the cartoon character created in 1919 by Australian animator Pat Sullivan, alongside a 1922 black and white film of Felix getting into strife.
At the entrance to the show is the latest ceramic artwork by Vipoo Srivilasa completed just weeks ago, a scene of two flower-covered male figures, each with a gilded cat, a faithful dog at their feet.
There's contemporary fashion too, with designs by the late Alexander McQueen, Di$count Univer$e, and Romance was Born.
The show has been a buzz to put together, said Benson, and a chance to draw on never-before-seen artworks from the permanent collection.
(NGV curators, newly attuned to the presence of animals in the collection, are even now uncovering items to include in the show).
While the exhibition design features paw prints on the floor and seats with tails, Benson warns animals must stay home.
"What a dog is going to get out of an art exhibition is beyond my comprehension - please do not bring your cats and dogs," he said.
Instead, gallery-goers can upload a snap of their favourite pet, choose a frame, and see an image of their beloved animal projected onto the gallery wall. Meow!
The exhibition opens Friday at The Ian Potter Centre: NGV Australia in Fed Square.
