In the early 16th century, as the cat's image improved, it was included in several paintings as a subject. In Adam and Eve (1504), Albrecht Durer depicts a cat as peaceful and gentle, as opposed to a snake. In this painting, the cat is unaware of the presence of the dog and the mouse, as human sin has not yet upset the harmony that reigns over Earth. This representation of a cat dozing at the couples feet has virtually become a classic, especially for Flemish artists such as Franz Pourbus the Elder (1570) and Pietr Jansz Saenredam (1797).
In these three paintings, the cat is represented as one animal among others as a reminder that Adam was given the duty of naming them all.
Leonardo da Vinci lovingly represented cats in many pieces in various realistic attitudes.
In their paintings, Philippe de Champaigne (1602-1674, Les pelerins d'Emmaus) [The Pilgrims of Emmaus] and Charles Le Brun (Le sommeil de l'enfant Jesus [The Sleeping Infant Jesus], 1655) introduced cats into the foreground.
The Annunciation was a recurring theme involving cats. Often indifferent to this major event, the cat appears to be drawn by the forces of evil. Le Tintoret must have shared this ambivalence toward cats, for the cat in his Annunciation bears a malevolent expression.
Jerome Bosch
He also linked the cat to the evils of hell in his Jardin des delices terrestres [Garden of Earthly Delights], but very anecdotally and naturally, since he depicted the devil in this form. This malevolent role appears frequently in representations of the Holy Family, including that by Baroccio (1563) and Portrait de famille [Family Portrait] by Georg Pencz (1541), which shows a cat stalking a goldfinch. This bird was known for its particular fondness for thistles, an allusion to Christ's crown of thorns. The cat eyeing the bird, a symbol of Christ the redeemer, embodies the evil that threatens the salvation of humanity.
Representations of the Holy Family by many other painters also include cats, but without a goldfinch: Leonardo da Vinci, Giulio Romano, Vermeyen, Murillo, Rembrandt, Frans Floris de Vriendt.
Cats also appear in Christ's life during times of celebration: The Wedding at Cana by Giuseppe Mazzuoli, Feast in the House of Levi by Paolo Veronese, or, more traditionally, in Veroneses The Last Supper, featuring a cat sleeping at Judas' feet, once again depicted as an accomplice of evil.
The dog-cat opposition, a symbolic allusion to the battle between good and evil, appears once again in several paintings, including The Last Supper (1481), painted in the Sistine Chapel by Cosimo Roselli.
The cat's presence in scenes following the Resurrection symbolizes Christ returned from the dead and now eternal. According to Valeriano, the cat embodies the moon and therefore signifies the beginning and end of all things.
The Life of the Virgin Mary
It is another pretext for numerous appearances by felines in pieces including La visitation [The Visitation] by Theodor van Loon.
Religious painters rarely depicted cats as companions, with the exception of the cat in St. Jerome's cell.
In the theme of the Vanities, the cat symbolizes the sense of sight. To this allegory were added the metaphors of feminine beauty and earthly love (Allegorie de la vue [Allegory of Sight], 1616, by Jan Saenredam; La vue [Sight], 1666, by Barent Fabritius; Portrait de jeune femme tenant un chat [Portrait of a Young Woman Holding a Cat], 1525, by Bacchiacca; and Vanite [Vanity], attributed to Pietr Wtewael).
Illustrating the passage of time, the theme of "clawing" symbolizes the fleeting nature of earthly pleasures (Enfants jouant avec un chat [Children Playing with a Cat] by Jan Miense Molenaer, Le coup de patte du chat [Clawing Cat] by Prud'hon, Charite [Charity] by Cornelis van Haarlem).
Meanwhile, an imaginary world based on the medieval bestiary gave rise to parody animal concerts. There was a true craze for this genre, especially among Flemish painters: Le concert de chats [The Concert of Cats] by David Teniers the Younger and an etching in which Jan Brueghel uses cats in place of notes on sheet music.
Rembrandt included cats in only one painting, Le menage du menuisier [The Woodworker's Household].
Having become a household animal, even among the middle class, the cat began appearing in pastoral compositions by Jacques Callot, Abraham Bosse, and David Teniers the Younger (Le concert des chats) [The Concert of Cats]. The painter Jordaens included cats in his drinking scenes.
Gerard Terborch also included cats in his La famille du remouleur [The Grinder's Family], as did Velasquez in his Fileuses [Spinners] (around 1657). Some consider these cats as symbols of freedom.
An etching by Pierre-Paul Prud'hon shown in the 1798 Exposition features a huge cat sitting at Liberty's feet as she tramples her chains.
During the Age of Enlightenment, Watteau painted cats full of grace and goodness.
Chardin painted a lovely cat in La blanchisseuse [The Laundress] but was more cruel in his other paintings, depicting the cat as pilfering and sneaky.
Eighteenth-century artists rediscovered cats as hunters that coexisted with game (François Desportes, Jean-Baptiste Oudry, and Gilles Colson). Louis Le Nain painted a contented cat curled up peacefully at the corner of the hearth.
Swiss painter Gottfried Mind (1768-1814), nicknamed the "Raphael of Cats", produced numerous paintings featuring cats, which he idolized. He even sculpted them from chestnuts. But cats returned to the flat background in paintings by Francois Boucher, Jean-Honore Fragonard, and Maurice Quentin de la Tour.
With rare exceptions, cats were treated in a conventional manner in European art. Cats were traditionally depicted as greedy and pilfering, curled up in a chair or in the arms of their mistress.
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