The art of the feline tattoo

There's a story behind this, a crappy one.

I spent most of the day working on a post I was very proud of. I accidentally discovered the exquisite cats of Japanese painter Kazuaki Horomito in a Facebook video, and quickly copied and embedded it on my blog. Or so I thought.

Then I happened to look at it. Less than half of it had posted. The whole lower half was gone. I was beside myself. I scrambled around to find some actual Horomito, and the internet was full of it. Everyone loves this stuff, and no wonder!  I assembled what I felt was a nice representative sample of his exotically tattooed cats, but then I thought I'd better take another shot at posting the video.

Jesus H. Christ. The whole thing disappeared! The entire post that I had worked on so painstakingly all day, making sure all the photos were the right size, etc., - down the fucking toilet.

Normally there's automatic backup when this happens. But this time, nothing. Just nothing at all. Since I am so stupidly committed to my useless work that nobody sees anyway, I scrambled around on YouTube and found an absolutely wonderful slideshow of Horomito, but it was set to the inane kiddie song, The Cat Came Back. No, I am not kidding! "Gimme a meow. Say, MEOWWWW!" I had prayed I would never hear that monstrosity again once my children were potty-trained.

 And the artist's name was spelled Horotimo.

So I ended up with this, inadequate, but at least an introduction to the images, which I was just about to delete out of my recycle bin forever.

Strangely enough, I keep thinking about The Waltzing Cat by Leroy Anderson, a better fit (for the cats are surely whimsical, just not sickeningly coy and cutesie). So listen to this while you're looking at them.

Jesus H. CHRIST!

Christ in a rowboat, what a scene. Crap on a cracker! Shit on a stick. Words fail me.

A bowl full of happiness: Sea Monkeys on parade

My latest attempt at animation, using images I've collected over the years. I have to admit I have a favorite: the guys in the pink velvet suits. I'm having tons of fun with this, with no talent whatsoever. Why wait for talent? The clock is ticking. I can't draw, paint, or any of that, but I can put images together in a way which amuses me. 

Bentley animation

 

My first attempt to animate my cat Bentley. After my experiments with Meryl Streep and Shirley MacLaine at the Oscars, their faces bordering on total hysteria, I thought, well, why not my cat? He is so sweet and photogenic that it was almost easy. Seven frames does limit the range of expression, however. From sleep, to alarm, to sleep.

Bentley's on TV!

Bentley never ceases to amaze us with his awareness of things. We've seen him watch TV before, ads and things like that, where patterns move rapidly. Cartoons are a favorite. But this time it was a show on CBC's The Nature of Things, all about the domestic cat. For the first five minutes he sat demurely, facing the TV with his ears alertly pricked. Then suddenly he jumped up on the TV stand as if he wanted to become part of the action on the screen.

Obviously he knew these were cats, but because we adopted him so young, I'm not sure how many cats he has actually seen or interacted with. But he knew. At some point he even looked around behind the screen, as if he thought the cats were actually there. Then he pawed at the screen the way he sometimes paws at the window. This carried on for at least half of the hour-long show, meaning my cat has a longer attention span than most humans.

He often did look like part of the show, which was a bit eerie. He fit right in. It gave the program an oddly 3D look. The first gif looks a bit like one of those silhouettes of a movie audience watching a romantic encounter on-screen.

Until that old geezer/cat expert comes on-screen, it looks for all the world as if Bentley is scratching at a real fence.

Bentley doesn't just want to be on TV. He wants to be in TV.