Most people would agree that dogs are a man’s best friend, but perhaps the same can be said about cats. Much like their canine counterparts, cats are furry, lovable, and terribly hard to resist. However, it must be said that they are different in one fundamentally important way: whereas dogs are warm, friendly, and fiercely loyal to their owners, cats are cold, snobbish, and unapologetically independent. It isn’t very difficult to see why. Throughout time immemorial, dogs have always bowed down to their human masters. But cats? They have it the other way around; they are our masters. And we have always happily obliged.
Dai.zuh, through her art, seems to take the inherent superiority of the cat as truth. In fact, an initial look at her works would leave one wondering why cats haven’t been the subject of more paintings. But just like these sly domesticated pets, her artworks can also be guilefully deceiving. Look at them in passing and one is left with the impression that he is looking at graphics put together by a computer. However, look at them again and one realizes that he is looking at illustrations so artfully painted with acrylic - in colors that truly pop - that they would always warrant a good second look from any passerby.
This is a testament to Dai.zuh’s background not only as a graphic artist, but also as a muralist and as an illustrator. If anything, her works of art are as chic as they are idiosyncratic. In Kitty Don’t Give a Shit, one is almost overwhelmed by all the various elements contained in the scene. It depicts a nonchalant cat being fed a piece of fish through a fishing rod, as another one skilleted to the bone hangs helplessly on its hook. All this is set amidst the background of a multicolored kitchen with checkerboard tiles and ovens with eyes that are so intrusive (as if those of the cat’s aren’t enough) so as to make the effect even more hypnotic. But perhaps this isn’t as glorious as Self Pawtrait, Dai.zuh’s second painting, which depicts the portrait of a cat standing atop a sofa as if to mark its territory by declaring its status as the reigning monarch of the household. Who would have thought that our furry feline friends would make such delightful muses?