Can you find the cat in this picture?
We stumbled upon this delicious, eye-catching genre painting, "Still Life with Fish" (55 x 75,6 cm, Groeninge Museum, Bruges), by the Baroque Flemish painter Alexander Adriaenssen (1587-1661) as we were Googling about -- despite the mega search engine's sinking stock value and disgraceful censorship to please their People's Republic overlords* -- trying to find the painting in our mind's eye that this image of last night's State of the Union ceremonies in the House of Representatives Chambers in the Capitol Building reminds us of [the painting of which this image reminds us?]. We came upon a totally awesome resource for images -- thumbnails you click on for larger images -- of Baroque art and pretty much every other era of art, but there are so many names that we would need a team of research assistants to find what we are looking for in a reasonable period of time. We obviously lack the patience of our Baroque forebears.
Detail reveals the eternal, opportunistic feline hanging around the herd, waiting for her chance. How many times have we caught this very moment with our own Tiny and Baby?
*Check out Paul Boutin, who notes ironically that "Chinese Google filter only works if you can spell" [via Pajamas Media's China Syndrome].
For more delicious, eye-catching things, be sure to check out this week's Cotillion, hosted by Right Girl.
The cat is the element that gives meaning to the painting, if you ask me. Without the eager face in the background, it's just a (very handsomely painted) pile of dead fish.
Posted by: CWC | February 05, 2006 at 01:14 PM