6/18/08

Catmasutra: Painting for different emotions

A little excerpt from youth.sg about Catmasutra - The Enlightened Series...


Who would have known that a creature that meows and purrs can relate to many of our humanly sentiments and even provide calmness within that subconscious mayhem?

“Painting is the passage from the chaos of the emotions to the order of the possible,” so said French painter Balthus. I presume that Catmasutra: Enlightened series creator Paul Koh must have that renowned quote etched in his mind while colouring each canvas. Each painting sheltered in Artoholic Gallery relates to our emotions through the situation faced by a cat and brings us to find solitary, making each paint-daubed canvas appropriate for a different occasion...

Though the cat is plastered with repetitive facial expressions canvas after canvas, its surroundings also draw out the cat’s emotions (and at times, ours too).

After-lunch contentment

As outwardly portrayed by the ‘green grass’ background, this painting seems inspired by the Taoist concept of yin and yang (uniting two total opposites). The Perfect Harmony of the living cat and the dead fish also shows the humanly after-lunch contentment. The cat shows its pleasure on its facial expression and the silhouette of the bird on the ‘grass’ denotes the fantastic feeling most of us have after savouring a delicious meal.

Read the full article by Nisha at youth.sg



Haha... The fish bone is actually a "wish" bone for the cat and it symbolizes our dreams and aspirations. When what we do matches what we dream about, then we're that much closer to happiness, and hence that eyes-wide-shut and ear-to-ear grin;) As long as the fish bone remains within sight and in the heart (or the mouth), the cat is happy. It also means "abundance" in reference to the Chinese greeting "Nian Nian You Yu" (or abundance year after year). "Fish" and "abundance" are pronounced the same way"Yu", but written differently. Of course, here the cat is always well-fed ("soul food") since , as it must be, when we do the things we love...

;)

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