Besides the snow, cold rains, distance from the mountains, distance from the ocean, and weird roads, there isn’t much I regret about moving to Edmonton all those years ago. But one of the reasons I chose Edmonton over, say, Calgary was the arts and culture scene. And over the years big oil in C-town and a general malaise in the E-town scene has slowly eroded the benefit of Edmonton over other locales.

Be that as it may, it is always so tempting to play the grass is greener game when you read about art etc. in the big big-cities. I mean why don’t we have an exhibit of 16th-19th century cat art? Huh! Why!

This is so awesome! The Japanese Society gallery in NYC (333 East 47th Street New York, NY) is hosting the following exhibit of woodblock prints this spring:

LIFE OF CATS: SELECTIONS FROM THE HIRAKI UKIYO-E COLLECTION

Fri, Mar 13 – Sun, Jun 7, 2015
Since arriving in Japan aboard Japanese ships transporting sacred Buddhist scriptures from China in the mid-sixth century, cats have proceeded to purr and paw their way into the heart of Japanese life, folklore, and art. Life of Cats: Selections from the Hiraki Ukiyo-e Collection illustrates the depth of this mutual attraction by mining the wealth of bravura depictions of cats to be found in ukiyo-e woodblock prints of the Edo Period (1615-1867).

You can see how this would be cause for jealousy in any lover of art/cats/woodblock printing.

Be sure to visit the Gallery site and flip through the whimsical and amusing prints; you just won’t have that many chances in life to empathize with a 19th century Japanese dude like this.