Picasso and the Cat: The Ultimate Shot on Montparnasse

Category: Anecdotes / Artistic Wit / Philosophy of Creation
Reading Time: 3 Min

His cat. My God, his cat! I tell you: it wasn’t an animal; it was an architectural blueprint of flesh and fury. It resembled a cat just enough to provoke a scandal, and just enough not to be ignored.

It was, as always, one of those dreary evenings where someone from the bohemian elite felt the pressing need to protest that Picasso was destroying everything they knew about art.

Yet another brave soul stepped up. He stared at the drawing and, gathering all his (seemingly little) intellectual courage, declared to the great Pablo: “That doesn’t look like a cat! That is, pardon me, rubbish!”

Picasso, this Spanish demon, always relished being questioned. He merely raised an eyebrow—an eyebrow that alone could replace an entire essay on his philosophy.

“Real cats,” he retorted coolly, “are made only by cats. And I, my dear friend, am not a cat. I am an artist.”

That was not an answer. That was a declaration of war on everyone who believed art was merely a mirror. He did not copy. He reigned. And, to hell with it, he always won.