Cat Is Art Spelled Wrong

Cat videos on the Internet are a cultural phenomenon, and this collection of essays takes the postmodern mediated feline more or less seriously. Most of the 16 essays are about cat videos or cats and art; the weakest ones are extended musings that address cats more generally. Carl Wilson’s contribution “East of Intention: Cat, Camera, Music” unearths the little-known history of cats on film. Sasha Archibald considers the aesthetics of cute in “Feline Darlings and the Anti-Cute.” Especially inspired is Elena Passarello’s “Jeoffrey,” an antiphonal collection of lines that interlock with “My Cat Jeoffry,” the best-known portion of a lengthy poem by 18th-century poet Jubilate Agno. Sarah Schultz, organizer of the first Internet Cat Video Festival, staged by the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, offers a curatorial view of the event in “There Was a Cat Video Festival in Minneapolis, and It Was Glorious.” The reader may wonder about the sanity of a few of the writers, but that is part of the wryness of it all. This clever collection is highly recommended for people who watch cat videos, which is apparently nearly everyone. (Sept.)