CBR14 BINGO: Question. The question is, “Have cat lovers gone too far?”
BINGO: Bodies, New, Dough, Question, Elephant
Have cat lovers gone too far? Did the guy who painted all those dogs playing poker go too far? Did Ted Turner go to far by colorizing all those old movies? Did Trey Parker and Matt Stone go too far with the HumancentiPad episode? Some of those questions are harder to answer than others. But as for the cats, I say “No! No! A thousand times no!”
If you are not familiar with Susan Herbert, she was an artist who made a name for herself recreating famous paintings but with cats in place of people. She published five such collections of feline tribute in her life, including Shakespeare Cats and a Cats in Art: Pop-up Book, before dying of cancer in 2014. This book, Cats Galore Encore! was published posthumously by her family.
Boasting such masterpieces as John William Waterhouse’s The Lady of Shalott and Mary Cassatt’s The Child’s Bath, this collection features the artist’s own cats, Polly and Clover, as well as myriad other felines of unknown background.
Oh, the humanity that comes through in those kitty faces. Diego Velázquez’s Rokeby Venus peers seductively from her mirror. Waterhouse’s Ophelia aches with pending doom. Such noble courage from the tiny visage of the titular subject in Daniel Maclise’s The Death of Nelson. What human counterparts could match such raw human emotion as these cats portray?
Herbert has also included scenes from the Sistine Chapel. Alas! If only Michelangelo had owned a cat, what beauty would now grace the ceiling of the Apostolic Palace!
If I have a complaint about this collection (Scratch out my eyes if I were to even suggest such a thing), it would be that since this is a follow-up to the original Cats Galore, many of the titles included are lesser known than those in the original. You won’t find a Girl with a Pearl Earring or a Mona Lisa in this bunch. But you will find two Van Gogh self portraits (before and after the unfortunate ear incident), several Monets, and Jean François de Troy’s stirring The Declaration of Love.
So no, I say cat lovers have not gone far enough. We need more cats in popular culture and painting is just the beginning. I will not rest peacefully until I see an all-cat remake of Mutiny on the Bounty. For now, I give you the Creation of Adam:
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