Cats in Art: The Briar Rose (Crane)

From my continuing weekly Sunday series of cats in art.  Having moved on from Stefano Zuffi's marvelous work, The Cat in Art, I am now using some ideas from Caroline Bugler's equally impressive book, The Cat/3500 Years of the Cat in Art.  You really should check out and/or own both of these wonderful works, easily available on Amazon or eBay (and I have no financial interest).

Image credit The Athenaeum, The Briar Rose (triptych, center panel), Walter Crane, tempura on panel, 23" x 17", held by Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum - Glasgow, United Kingdom.

And the kitty close-up from over on the right foreground:

You know how cats just love musical instruments!  Why, the kitty can no more ignore that mandolin (or whatever it is) then it can just stop breathing.  Kind of analogous to cardboard boxes, a book on a lap, computer keyboards, or newspapers on the floor.

But seriously, this is a disturbing image.  First off, the guy is clearly invading the sleeping beauty's space, thus even if he indeed is Prince Charming, he is a creepy, lascivious character.  Next, the animals seem completely oblivious to the intruder (while that would be OK for the cat--that's just what they do--the sleeping dog is puzzling).  And finally, what do we make of the hooded person in the back, past the bed?  Presumably she (?) is a servant, but what is she holding on her lap?  And as a minimum, her watching skills are sorely lacking!


[Gary note: With my Cats in Arts posts, I encourage you to scope out the art appreciation site Artsy (I have no financial interest in the site, I just like it), where you can explore many aspects of the world of art.  You'll certainly be entertained and enlightened!]

Cats in Art: At Home: A Portrait (Crane)

From my continuing weekly Sunday series of cats in art.  Having moved on from Stefano Zuffi's marvelous work, The Cat in Art, I am now using some ideas from Caroline Bugler's equally impressive book, The Cat/3500 Years of the Cat in Art.  You really should check out and/or own both of these wonderful works, easily available on Amazon or eBay (and I have no financial interest).

Image credit The Athenaeum, At Home: A Portrait, Walter Crane, 19872, tempera on paper, 28" x 16", held by Leeds Art Gallery, UK.

And the kitty close-up:

Bugler tells us:

A tabby cat is the final domestic touch in Walter Crane's portrait of his wife, Frances, painted during their extended honeymoon in Italy.  The cat must surely be the family pet, but it has all the gravitas of Egyptian sculptures of the feline goddess Bastet; only the twitching ears indicate that this is a live creature rather than a statue.

My take is that this was a brave couple to take a cat to Italy on their honeymoon....which indicates the depth of affection the cat must have had for its humans to undertake such a journey.


[Gary note: With my Cats in Arts posts, I encourage you to scope out the art appreciation site Artsy (I have no financial interest in the site, I just like it), where you can explore many aspects of the world of art.  You'll certainly be entertained and enlightened!]

Cats in Art: Woman Holding a Cat (Kuniyoshi)...plus a Wedding

Life has interfered with blogging, as so often happens.  Daughter just got married to a wonderful man, so our weekend was just a tad busy.

So....a day late, here's a Cats in Art post from 5 years ago.  I chose this one because the cat I refer to, Ca Beere, was our daughter's but now is ours (and yes, the cat still exists).

Here is the original link from 2 Sept 2012.  Dedicated to our daughter and new son-in-law.

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Woman Holding a Cat (Kuniyoshi)

From my continuing weekly Sunday series of cats in art. I'm using some ideas from the coffee table book, The Cat in Art, by Stefano Zuffi.

Image credit Zazzle.  Woman Holding a Cat, Utagawa Kuniyoshi, 1852, colored xylograph, 14" x 10", held by private collector.

May as well continue with a Japanese theme...last week's post was a Hiroshige image.

Zuffi really gets into it:

A perfectly dressed and made-up geisha, wrapped in the silk of an embroidered kimono, attempts to ward off the excessive affections of a magnificent white cat.  It is a pet, but also a sort of refined "domestic furnishing," as demonstrated by the knotted ribbon around its neck and its soft, carefully brushed fur, into which the woman sinks her fingers with pleasure.  There is an interesting contrast between the cat's onslaught and the much more dangerous scene depicted in the background, in which a gigantic octopus is threatening a small fishing boat.

Wow...getting kinda steamy here.  Good thing it's in a private collection, otherwise I'd have to hop a plane to check it out firsthand.

One of our cats, De Beere, is what we call a "face kitty," meaning she likes to burrow into your neck and face and lick.  It's fun for a moment but then you go into defensive mode like the geisha above depicted by Kuniyoshi.

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By the way, here is Ca Beere--Steeler fan--in a recent photo:

Cats in Art: Puss in Boots (Millais)

From my continuing weekly Sunday series of cats in art.  Having moved on from Stefano Zuffi's marvelous work, The Cat in Art, I am now using some ideas from Caroline Bugler's equally impressive book, The Cat/3500 Years of the Cat in Art.  You really should check out and/or own both of these wonderful works, easily available on Amazon or eBay (and I have no financial interest).

This is the second of a pair of posts on the art of John Everett Mallais from the late 1800s.

Image credit The Athenaeum, Puss in Boots, John Everett Millais, 1877, oil on canvas, 42" x 31", held by The McManus: Dundee's Art Gallery and Museum, Dundee, Scotland.

And the kitty close-up:

Oh, the indignity!!!  A cat, forced to wear boots!!!  

Tail up, the kitty is regarding the girl (its owner?), while the girl is steadily looking at the painter.  Cat toys appear on the floor, and the doll may be an object of interest as well for the cat.  However, relief from the hated boots is not coming anytime soon, it appears.

One can't help but think that this painting's colors must have deteriorated over the140 years since Millais painted it--the poor cat's upper half is virtually indistinguishable from the girl's dress or pillow, whatever is immediately behind the cat.  Surely Millais would not have painted brown-on-brown in this fashion...though perhaps what we are seeing is a reproduction failure in copying the painting to paper.

Guess a trip to Scotland is in order to actually stand in front of this painting and see what the colors really look like.  Road trip!

[Gary note: With my Cats in Arts posts, I encourage you to scope out the art appreciation site Artsy (I have no financial interest in the site, I just like it), where you can explore many aspects of the world of art.  You'll certainly be entertained and enlightened!]