Girl playing with cat

Albert Anker's 'Girl Playing with Cat' (1887) is a characteristic domestic genre subject by the Swiss painter who was most celebrated for his depictions of Swiss village children. The child with cat subject was among the most universally appealing of domestic genre subjects, the relationship between the child and the domestic animal offering both formal interest (the varied forms of child and cat in play) and the emotional warmth of the trusting relationship between young humans and familiar animals. Anker's treatment would combine his direct observational honesty with his genuine affection for the children of the Ins village.

Anker renders the girl and her cat with the warm naturalism that characterized all his best child subjects — the child's absorbed engagement with the cat and the cat's specific response (whether playing, resistant, or affectionate) depicted with close observational accuracy. His handling of the two figures' interaction within the domestic space — the specific quality of light and the particular character of each figure — gives the genre subject its warmth and specificity.