Cats in Art: Cat Playing With Two Dogs (Potter)

From my continuing weekly Sunday series of cats in art. The bride and I visited the Philadelphia Museum of Art last weekend, so the next few Sunday Cats in Art posts will be from that museum. We thoroughly enjoyed looking around the galleries for cats.

Photo by Gary, of painting at Philadelphia Museum of Art (click to enlarge), Cat Playing With Two Dogs, Paulus Potter, 1652, oil on canvas.
This particular painting--some 360 years old--depicts a rather large feline "playing" with two dogs.  It looks to me as though this kitty could have the dogs for lunch.  They exist at the whim of the cat...which is as it should be.

Actually, the info at the painting suggests that the cat represents the surging Dutch nationalism, while the dogs represent the Spanish, whose power and influence were waning at that time.

I wonder who knocked over the chair?  Must have been the goofy dogs.