Alphacat 2020

Cats, ever true to their nature, were never going to be well disposed to following UK government guidance on domestic lockdown procedures. There was talk that all pets would be ‘confined to barracks’ for fear that petting them would spread the virus. But, like so much governmental guidance, it ended up being confused and this particular initiative was eventually abandoned.

The Cambridge-based painter and illustrator Annabel Lee, like most people, received no human visitors to her garden for the first few weeks of lockdown. However, she continued to receive visits from the local cats – and she started to paint them. Then as word spread, cats from neighbouring streets started requesting that they too have their portrait painted. By the end of the project, cats from as far afield as Bosnia & Herzegovina were sending photographs of themselves in the hope of being included in Annabel’s alphabetic Alphcat. To read more of Annabel’s alphabetic adventure, click here.