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Judy Walker - The Boy Who Drew Cats
Category: Sculpture.
The four panels are loomed. The cat and rat were sculped from taxidermist’s foam and covered in variable drop peyote stitch. Detail are in right-angle weave and brick stitch.
The Boy Who Drew Cats
A Japanese Folktale
Long ago, in Japan, there was a boy who could not help drawing cats. He drew cats on every surface he found, and when he drew cats around the edges of a valuable scroll, his master grew enraged and cast him out of the monastery where he was a pupil. The master offered the boy one final piece of advice as he left: “Avoid large open places and sleep in small, closed places.”
As the boy traveled, searching for a home, he came upon an abandoned temple where he thought he could take shelter for a night. To his delight, he found clean white rice paper screens everywhere, and quickly taking his brush and ink in hand, he painted cats until not one single surface remained. Growing tired, he prepared to sleep, and, remembering his master’s words, he crept into a tiny cabinet and closed the door.
During the night, he was awakened to the terrifying sounds of screeching, crashing battle. He huddled in his little cabinet in fear, not daring to move. In the morning, when all was silent, he cautiously peered out. To his astonished eyes was revealed a horrible sight: rats everywhere, dead in pools of blood, huge rats that had come to kill and devour him. What had saved him?
Then he noticed, on the mouths and claws of his painted cats, delicate lines of blood. His cats had saved him, and he knew that he would draw cats for the rest of his life.
(This folktale is thought to be about the 1 5th century Japanese artist Sesshu Toyo, whose ink drawings of animals were said to be so lifelike they seemed to move.)
Construction pictures will soon be available on Judy's website.
Judy can be contacted at judywalker.no.spam@pobox.com.