I Got a Cat So I Could Paint Cats

I found Sanmu on Taobao in 2013.

At the time, I was already taking pet portrait commissions, painting other people’s cats and dogs, but had never kept a pet myself. A client gave me a photograph, I painted it, and that seemed to be where the exchange ended.

I knew that someone’s wish for a portrait of their pet involved affection and expectations, but felt I could not quite understand it from within. In our conversations, I could only discuss the matter at hand: that photograph, that painting.

A photograph showed me what the animal looked like. But when it came to painting, I felt something of its spirit was missing. I wondered whether this was because I had never kept a cat and did not know what living with one felt like.

I could see the cat in the photograph, but had never had the experience of an owner looking at their own cat every day. Why they loved it so much, why they wanted to paint it: photographs alone did not seem quite enough to understand that feeling.

Around then, I had enrolled in an in-person watercolor class. Many classmates had pets, especially cats. Being around them, I gradually began to think: perhaps I should get one too.

Then I could paint my own cat in everyday life, and perhaps understand clients’ feelings a little better when we talked. More practically, I also hoped to give my pet portrait business something more to show.

These thoughts came together, and I really did prepare to go and see some cats.

After the watercolor class, a classmate accompanied me. This friend had kept cats for many years. I knew nothing and wanted someone to help me look.

I had seen a listing on Taobao for cats raised in someone’s home, so we went to their house. It was the first time I had entered a stranger’s home specifically to see cats.

More than ten years later, many details really are a little hazy. I remember the place was quite large, and that I met Sanmu’s parents. There were four kittens. Two had what I remember as the standard American Shorthair markings, while the other two cost more. Silver tabby or silver shaded: I can no longer quite distinguish those names.

The less expensive pair were 1,800 yuan each. The others may have been 2,500, or some other amount. I cannot remember accurately.

It was my first time getting a cat, my business was still taking shape, and my budget was limited. For me, it was simply about wanting a cat. Nothing more.

I asked my friend to see which kitten was more active and how they seemed overall. Since I did not know, I trusted my friend’s judgment. In the end, we chose this little cat.

After coming home, I named him Sanmu.

The name came from what I was doing then, “Huisenhuo” (绘森活). Hui, 绘, means painting; huo, 活, points to living well. The name also plays on “knowing how to live.” A woodland-inspired style was popular then, and I liked the feeling, so I put sen, 森, meaning forest, in the middle.

When naming the cat, I took that character 森 apart.

It contains three 木, the character for tree or wood. Three trees: Sanmu. It was easy to say too.

With Huisenhuo, I wanted to paint and live well. When I later had my own cat, I took part of his name from it. The cat I painted every day was also called by a name drawn from my own work.

Occasionally, looking back, I still feel there was a little fate in it. Metal, wood, water, fire, and earth: Sanmu seems to have supplied me with quite a lot of “wood.” Of course, that is metaphysics. I never thought about it when choosing the name.

Over our years together, though, Sanmu really has proved to be a cat who suits me. It feels as if neither of us needs to change the other for things to be just right. There are many small stories about that “just right” that I can tell slowly later.

I painted him quite a lot over the years, and wrote some short records too. Looking back now, I realize some things have grown hazy. Even the room where I first went to see him remains only as “quite large.” So I want to write down these bits and pieces while I can still remember some of them.

But all of that came later. When I went to see cats in 2013, I simply wanted one of my own, so I could paint him in everyday life.

The views, experiences, and final judgments in this article are the author’s. AI assisted with organizing the text.