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Phil Douglis | all galleries >> Galleries >> Gallery Seventy Nine: at the zoo > Massage, San Diego Zoo, San Diego, California, 2010
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05-SEP-2010

Massage, San Diego Zoo, San Diego, California, 2010

While visiting the pigmy chimpanzee enclosure at the San Diego Zoo, we met a fellow who over the years has come to know each of these remarkable animals in a very intimate way. They allow him to massage them through the heavy glass plate walls of their enclosure. This chimpanzee enthusiastically opens his arms and presses his chest to the glass to feel the rhythmic pulsations of the man’s fists. We can almost feel the energy of the massage and savor the pleasure it seems to bring to the animal. It is rare when visitors can relate to captive zoo animals in such intimate fashion, and this image takes the measure of that intimacy.

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Phil Douglis01-Oct-2010 18:36
Yes, this is about bridging the barriers that exist between man and nature. Somehow this man and this ape have bonded here, in spite of the thick glass that separates them.
Tim May01-Oct-2010 15:48
Again - here is an example of the barriers that we find in life and zoos and how even the strongest of barriers can be bridged.
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