Studies of Cats

Studies of Cats (猫図, Neko-zu) is an album of sketches by Konoshima Ōkoku, executed in ink on paper as part of his lifelong practice of drawing animals from life. Cats were a regular subject for nihonga painters from the late Edo period onward — Maruyama Ōkyo's studies of cats are among the foundational works of the Shijō school's shasei tradition — and Ōkoku's sketches continue this lineage with the close anatomical observation that he had cultivated since his apprenticeship with Imao Keinen. The drawings record the particular postures of domestic cats in repose and motion, with the kind of attention to fur texture, body weight, and joint structure that distinguishes the Maruyama-Shijō tradition from the more decorative cat imagery of the [ukiyo-e](/glossary/ukiyo-e) school. As studies rather than formal exhibition works, they offer a direct view of the underlying observational practice on which his finished paintings rested. The drawings survive in the public domain through Japanese copyright law and have been widely reproduced through Wikimedia Commons.