■ As a cat lover and cat painter, Utagawa Kuniyoshi, a master ukiyo-e master of the Edo period in Japan, vividly depicts the animal's expression and posture.
When it comes to cats, people think more about "indifference" and "alienation"... And not just simply cute. They seem to be less sympathetic to the master-slave relationship and tend to be more equal to each other. They need to establish their own space for solitude, but the occasional coddling is irresistible. It is precisely in this way that more and more people, especially artists or literary masters, are attracted to it.
Clever and changeable:
The image of a cat in literature and painting
Courtesy photo, support/British Library
■ The famous 19th-century British illustrator Louis Wayne was famous for his love of cats and his ability to draw cats.
<h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="01" > the "cat" in the book</h1>
For a long time, cats were considered in Western cultures to be witches' friends, pets, avatars of Satan, messengers of hell, and unpleasant. It took a long time for the cat to be recognized by the mainstream, becoming a member of most people's homes and even a favorite pet in their arms. In particular, some literary and artistic masters regard them as life partners who rely on each other. The famous American novelist Ernest Hemingway's love of cats is no longer a new topic, and Japan's Yukio Mishima, Haruki Murakami, domestic Qian Zhongshu, Lao She and other well-known writers also have a fondness for cats. It can be seen that whether in the past or now, whether the image of the cat in Chinese and Western cultures is positive or not, the books, paintings, works of art and animated films with it as the protagonist are more and more, emerging in an endless stream, and always gain a large number of fans.
Charles Perrault (1628-1703), the "father of French children's literature" who wrote many popular fairy tales such as "Cinderella", "Little Red Riding Hood" and "Sleeping Beauty in the Woods", was one of the most famous Writers in France in the 17th century. He also has a classic fairy tale about cats, Le Matre chat (The Cat in Boots), which is known to most people and has been circulating for a long time.
■ Poster of the fairy tale drama "The Cat in boots", 1887.
Created in 1697, this fairy tale is a concise and vivid story with bizarre and fascinating plot twists. The story tells the story of a cat named Puss, relying on a pair of "magical" boots and extraordinary wisdom, to break through many difficulties and help the young son of the poor owner, the miller, win the princess's heart and finally achieve a happy ending.
Illustration of The Cat in Boots, 2016, published by Frederick Vaughan Corporation.
The reason why Perot's fairy tales are popular with the public is that he is good at using his rich imagination to unfold a beautiful scene full of dreams but reasonable for the reader, placing the wishes and ideals of the general public in the background of fantasy, intersecting with reality and full of vitality. Borrowing from Booth's clever cat, he refers to those who use their wisdom to confront the tyranny of the ruling class and celebrate their tireless efforts to fight for equality and freedom.
● Illustration of "The Cat in boots", Victorian era, England.
In 2011, "Cat in Boots" was also adapted by DreamWorks Studios into an animated film on the big screen, which was slightly different from the characters in the original book. In the film, Booth transforms into a western swordsman wearing boots, a sword around his waist, and a low voice, playing the role of a hero like Zorro who robs the rich and the poor. There is also another female cat named Kitty Softpaws, who is very skilled and has an adventure with Booth. The cats in the film are very good at dancing Flamenco (traditional Spanish dance), and there is a scene in which Booth and the soft-clawed girl clap their hands in a rhythmic background music, tap the dance steps, circle each other, and make eye contact, which is very infectious. The cat's unique soft posture is vividly displayed in the dance posture, and the viewer seems to have forgotten their cat identity, but instead exclaims the superb dancing skills and immersion of the two dancers.
■ In the animated film, Booth and the Soft Claw Girl kick and dance to the sound of music, full of vitality.
The world-famous fairy tale Alices Adventures in Wonderland is a work by the British writer Lewis Carroll (1832-1898), which also features a strange cat, the Cheshire Cat. It is a fictitious short-haired cat, always grinning and floating around, its large green eyes and jagged fangs make its smile elegant and slightly eerie, although not good-looking in the traditional sense, but the Cheshire cat is one of the most favored characters in the whole story. In particular, it can appear out of thin air and disappear at any time, and the scene where the smile is still hanging in mid-air after disappearing is even more impressive. Many Westerners today also refer to people who smirk with their teeth as Cheshire cats.
■ In 1871, British cartoonist and illustrator Sir John Tenniel created an illustration for Alice in Wonderland, showing a Cheshire cat with its iconic smile looking down at Alice under a tree.
Particularly Cats is a nonfiction masterpiece by the 2007 Nobel Prize in Literature winner and British writer Doris Lessing (1919-2013). Doris, also known as a cat lover, once wrote: "In the years when I knew cats and spent my whole life with cats, what finally precipitated in my heart was a kind of sadness, which was not the same as the sentimentality caused by humans." ”
Doris's meticulous observation of cats, integrates her feelings for this small animal into the book, uses delicate brushstrokes and language to tell the moving story between people and cats, and tells the reader about a cat that only makes her happy and sad. These cats construct a living world through which people can examine and contemplate the humanity behind them.
The American writer Alison Nastasi has published an interesting photographic book, Artists and Their Cats, which includes more than 50 well-known artists including Pablo Picasso, Agnès Varda, Salvador Dali, Marcel Duchamp and other precious photos of their cats, from which readers can see another look and state of these masters when they get along with their cats. In Alison's mind, cats, like artists, are full of mystery and mavericks. Although cats and dogs are both pets and have been with humans for thousands of years, they never seem to be fully domesticated, and they do not desire to get a lot of attention from their owners, so they can maintain a mutually beneficial and symbiotic relationship with the artist, which can stimulate the owner's inspiration and creativity, add vitality, and enjoy their time alone without disturbing each other.
■ In 1865, Louis Wayne painted three tabby cats dancing Polka (a Czech folk dance) for light music composer P. Bucalossi.
<h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="02" > legendary "Wayne Cat"</h1>
The famous 19th-century British illustrator Louis Wain (1860-1939) was known for his love of cats and his ability to draw cats. Wayne was born in 1860 in Clerkenwell, north-east london. Suffering from cleft lip and palate, doctors advised him not to go to school until he was ten years old, so as not to be too young to withstand the ridicule and humiliation around him. But after that, Wayne was very isolated at school and unable to get along with his teachers and classmates normally. Skipping school and wandering the streets was how he spent most of his childhood, and it wasn't until he entered the West London School of Art, now the University of the Arts London, that he found something he loved and devoted himself to— painting.
At the age of 23, Wayne married emily Richardson, his sister's governess, and Emily got a kitten, Peter, who at first drew many sketches of it as a model, and in the process he became fascinated with the animal. Emily also suggested that he create more cat-themed paintings and submit them to the newspaper. In 1886, Wayne painted a "Kitten's Christmas Party" for the London News Christmas print. This is his first anthropomorphic cat, in which 150 cats are endowed with human movements and looks. They stand and walk freely, dressed in elaborate clothes and elegant manners, chatting, singing, dancing, and playing in the party, each of which is different and very interesting. This work made Wayne famous and a great success.
■ In Louis Wayne's "Kitten's Christmas Party", more than 100 cats are well-dressed, elegant, and in different postures, but they are all vivid.
Since then, Wayne's cat paintings have become popular and popular. In his paintings, these cats are dressed in fashionable clothes, drinking tea, drinking, golfing, opera, card, fishing, although they are no different from humans, but they do not lose the nature and habits of cats. There are thousands of looks on the human face, and from the faces of these cats can also find a rich expression: elegance, confidence, cunning, gloom, indifference, is the unique temperament of each "Wayne cat", they may not be cute in the conventional sense, but they can firmly grasp people's eyes. Wayne once said in the New York Times: "When a person draws a cat, his attention must be more focused on the paper than on the animal, so that he can constantly form new ideas."
Wayne is not simply obsessed with the cat in his creations, he is also active in various animal protection organizations and groups as a cat lover. From 1898 to 1911, he also served as president of the National Cat Club.
■ Wayne and his kittens in the creation.
But Emily later died of cancer, which was a big blow to Wayne. Coupled with the outbreak of the First World War, the demand for works of art in society as a whole fell sharply, and his economic situation deteriorated day by day. As the only man in the family, Wayne, who has been living with his 5 younger sisters, has a heavier burden on his shoulders, and the worsening condition has made him mentally problematic, emotionally unstable and occasionally violent, and eventually diagnosed with schizophrenia. Fortunately, with the financial support of some British celebrities, a fund was set up to help Wayne treat his illness and live. In 1930 Wayne was admitted to a hospital in Hertfordshire, north London, where he spent the last dozen years of his life. It's beautiful and accompanied by a herd of cats. Despite the ravages of illness, Wayne never stopped working and focused on cats. Although perhaps because of the illness, the cats in the painting are more and more abstract, seem to lose their way, gradually can not see the form, and finally even become like the fragments in the kaleidoscope, complex and messy, but people who like it feel that it is a morbid beauty, with a different kind of sensory stimulation, they call these cats "kaleidoscope cats". Wayne's style of work from different periods is highly consistent with his mental state, and the connections they inspire are wonderful and addictive. These works were later used as case studies in psychology and psychiatric textbooks.
■ At the beginning of the illness, although the style of the Wayne cat was different from before, the shape of the cat could still be seen.
■ As Wayne's illness worsens, the cat under the brush becomes more and more abstract and gradually unable to distinguish forms.
■ The "Kaleidoscope Cat" is full of strong visual sensory stimulation, and more and more rich lines and patterns are conjured up in the continuous cascading.
< h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="03" > Japan "Cat Culture"</h1>
In many Works of Literature and Painting in Japan, the figure of cats is not uncommon. Since entering Japan from China with ships in the middle of the 6th century AD, cats have entered the lives of the Japanese people with their unique temperament and gained love. There are depictions of cats in books such as the Heian period essay collection Pillow Kusako and the novel The Tale of Genji, which were the pets of the Japanese nobility and did not begin to enter the homes of ordinary people until the Edo period. Because of its "aristocratic temperament", Japanese people can be said to be very obsessed with cats, and their feelings for cats have become part of the culture of this island country, and the so-called "cat culture" is reflected in Japanese literature, painting, anime, film and television works.
■ The cat that is washing is no different from ordinary people in every move.
Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1798-1861), a Japanese master of ukiyo-e of the Edo period, was a cat lover. Not only did he keep cats around his home, but he was said to even hold cats in his arms when painting. The animal's most everyday state of life is vividly outlined by Utagawa Kuniyoshi's refined brushstrokes. In his paintings, cats do not show cuteness, they either steal fish, scratch their heads, yawn, or wander in the corner. In addition, Utagawa Kuniyoshi also depicted cats in the form of adults, using them as a carrier to express the daily life of the general public in the Edo period. Cats are dressed in Japanese clothes and have a variety of postures, and if you look closely, you will find that the decorations on their clothing are iconic and cat-like things such as small fish and bells, and their minds are quite clever. These cats are like people or drunkenly dancing, or singing with a violin, or juggling with the top ball, or gathering to roam the streets. Utagawa Kuniyoshi also makes humorous and witty annotations on the side, making the painting more meaningful, which shows that his obsession with cats is extraordinary.
■ Utagawa Kuniyoshi shows his observations of people through cats, and the posture of the cats presented is delicate and changeable, the brushstrokes are sharp and refined, and each one is accompanied by humorous annotations.
Natsume Soseki (1867-1916) was a famous Japanese novelist known as the "Great National Writer", whose masterpiece and novel "I Am a Cat" was well received. The novel, which took more than two years to complete, is based on the story of a cat from the home of a poor teacher, anthropomorphizing it into a thinking and knowledgeable cat, and observing the human psyche from the perspective of a cat. It vividly reflects the thinking and life of the Japanese petty and middle bourgeoisie at the beginning of the 20th century, and sharply criticizes the bad impact of meiji "civilization" on people's spiritual world.
■ The actor in the painting has funny movements and humorous expressions, and the kittens at his feet seem to swing left and right with him, jumping up and down. The painting was created between about 1755 and 1810.
Yoko Sano, a famous Japanese picture book author, published a book in 2004, "Cats That Lived 1 Million Times", which is also her masterpiece. The book tells the legendary story of a tabby cat that has experienced 1 million lives and deaths. This cat has been loved by 1 million owners, including kings, thieves, old men, and little girls, and every time they rejoice at the cat and are sad about the cat's departure. On the contrary, this cat did not care, did not shed tears, and lived so proudly for a lifetime. It wasn't until it fell in love with a white cat that it had a heartwarming feeling for the first time and found the meaning of being alive. When the beloved white cat died, the cat, which had not been emotional for 1 million years, wept and then died peacefully. Yoko Sano uses simple and concise pictures and words to explore an eternal theme of life: life, death and love. This is a fable for adults to read, and children can also benefit from it, know love, give love, and get love.
■ Illustrations in Japanese folk tale books, a few cats on a screen are particularly eye-catching, 1905.
In the book "Love Cat Quirrell" by Japanese photographer Araki Nobuyoshi, in addition to recording his remembrance of his deceased wife, he also includes hundreds of photos of his love cat, delicately and gently capturing every vivid moment of this little creature, so that these time images accompany him through the years.
In addition, the well-known Japanese writers Yukio Mishima, Haruki Murakami and Junichiro Tanizaki are also cat lovers, and they have spent most of their lives with cats and snuggled with each other. Japanese scholar Kazunari Suzumura analyzes The work of Haruki Murakami in the book Haruki Murakami, revealing to the reader the world of a fun "Haruki Murakami Cat", which also tells the story between Yukio Mishima and the cat, and Junichiro Tanizaki and the cat.
■ Utagawa Kuniyoshi's grasp of the cat's demeanor stems from his personality of "loving cats and becoming obsessed".
<h1 class="pgc-h-decimal" data-index="04" > "cat" on the screen</h1>
Compared with the elegant and charming or cunning cats in the book paintings, there is a cat named Tom who accompanies the childhood of generations with its clumsy and funny image, and it and the little mouse named Jerry are regarded as the strongest enemies of each other, and they are fighting with wits and courage at every moment, even if most of the time Tom is fooled by Jerry and bad luck. This pair of enemies is sometimes intolerable, fighting continuously, sometimes shaking hands and talking, calling brothers and brothers, and all kinds of tricks of deceitful each other emerge in an endless stream, staging one plot after another of "stupid cats" and "clever little mice" laughing.
"Legendary figure" in hollywood, animation director Joseph Barbera (1911-2006) and another animation master William Dunby William Denby "Bill" Hanna (1910-2001), created in 1940, "Tom and Jerry", which won the Oscar for Best Animated Short Film and the Emmy Award for Best Animated Short Film, is a highly successful masterpiece. Although the protagonist of the story is a pair of cats and mice, but the present is not the cruelty of the survival of the fittest in the real animal kingdom, although they are natural enemies of each other, these two "neighbors" are only for some trivial and strife chase and fight, coupled with a lot of witty humor plot injection, can always make people laugh, is a rare classic animation series suitable for all ages.
■ Joseph Barbera made Tom and Jerry a "happy enemy" a classic animated image that both children and adults love.
But Tom isn't the first cat to appear in the anime. In 1919, Felix The Cat was released, and this curious, mischievous little black cat was the most popular animated character in the United States in the first half of the 20th century. Its creator was Otto Messmer (1892–1983), a cartoonist known as the "Father of felix cats". As the first cartoon character with thoughts, ideas, and deeds, and the first cartoon character to become a commodity, felix cats were popular in the United States at that time, and even the second team of the US army chose it as a mascot. Although its brilliance was later overshadowed by the "latecomer" Mickey Mouse, for many elderly viewers, especially american audiences, its classic image of energetic and often anxious pacing is still deeply rooted in the mind and has not been dissipated. To this day, the Felix cat is still in the limelight, not only the lucky badge of a squadron of the US Naval Aviation Corps, but also its black figure can often be seen on major parades.
■ A procession of Felix cats. Dozens of marchers dressed in costumes printed with the classic image of Felix cats dragged a giant inflatable Felix cat through the street, which was spectacular.
Garfield, an American comic strip series born in 1978, by James Robert James Robert "Jim" Davis. This big cat, which is always a delicious and lazy look, has swept the world with its iconic orange-yellow fur and lazy and fat image, and has gained many fans since its birth, and it can be said to be very successful as an anime character. The name "Garfield" derives from the author James's grandfather, a grumpy, cynical, big man, which is very similar to garfield," a quirky, vain, narcissistic, and satirical Garfield.
■ Garfield has swept the world with its iconic orange-yellow fur and lazy and cute image, and has gained many fans since its birth.
James focused on creating Garfield's funny and often self-centered image in the early stages, and after Garfield began to appear as a two-legged figure, its psychological and behavioral characteristics became closer and closer to humans, and the comic theme gradually added sitcom components, and was more inclined to satire and black humor. Today, Garfield comics have been serialized for more than 40 years, one by one, without interruption.
■ In the movie "Garfield 2 Double Cat", Garfield followed her owner to London and began another legendary adventure.
In Japan, there are also many anime works with cats as the protagonist, and the movie "The Cat's Reward" adapted from the works of the famous Japanese manga artist Aoi is one of the representatives. This is a fantasy animated film released by Ghibli, a well-known Japanese studio, in 2002. The story begins with a 17-year-old high school girl named Haru Yoshioka (Koharu) accidentally saving a cat that was almost crushed by a car on her way home from school. The rescued cat actually thanked Koharu with human etiquette, and she was surprised by the appearance. It turned out that this seemingly ordinary cat was actually the cat king's son, and at this point, the whole cat country regarded Koharu as a great benefactor and repaid her kindness in a cat-specific way. For example, putting carefully packaged mice in Xiaochun's locker, or planting cattail grass in her family yard, etc., made Xiaochun cry and laugh. In addition to the gentle and elegant cat prince, the wise and calm cat baron, the fat and fat cat, the weak and kind white cat Xiaoxue, the unreasonable cat king, and the large and small cats with different appearances but different characteristics, the multiple personalities of cats are shown in this 75-minute long animated film, plus the dramatic plot that is exaggerated and amplified in the animation, making the whole story interesting.
■ "The Cat's Reward" presents cats of different appearances but different characteristics, leading the viewer into a magical cat country.
In addition, there is the "Blue Fat Man" robot cat that has been popular for half a century, the cat-like robot that looks strange but has captured a huge number of fans. It is said that at that time, the manga artist Fujiko F. Fujio suddenly broke into a kitten in his home and kicked down the tumbler toy to inspire him, combining the two to create a unique "cat". The 1980s Japanese cartoon "Cat Monster Mike" is also an outstanding animation work that accompanies the "80s" and "90s" generations of children. There are also the popular cat teachers in the fantasy animation "Natsume's Friend's Account", and the tabby striped kittens in "Sweet Private Cat", although most of these cat characters are only fictional, they are not only the childhood companions of children, but also the old memories that adults will never forget.
■ On March 19, 2008, Doraemon and Nobita attended the "Inauguration Ceremony of the Anime Culture Ambassador of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Japan" held in Tokyo, Japan, and Doraemon became the first "Anime Culture Ambassador" to promote Japanese pop culture overseas.
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This article was originally published in civilization magazine in June 2019
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