Pam’s Pictorama Photo Post: This cyanotype postcard caught my eye the other day. I have a special soft spot for cats sporting a mustache and it has given me an excuse for a very all #Caturday sort of Pictorama post today. My cat Otto was my only mustachioed cat and had a perfect little Chaplin (Hitler?) mustache on her tuxedo face. Our Cookie, below, has a sloppy half one which is more like a painted smile on one side. She is not a symmetrical cat.

The Japanese, a cat loving culture as a whole, seem to have a special yen for white cats with black mustaches, which do look remarkably like early Japanese prints. Instagram is full of them. Some are rescues with one ear clipped while others look quite posh. For some reason they look like the cat equivalent of used car salesmen to me. I cannot seem to find any particular reason why the Japanese are especially fond of the look, but I do love finding them in my cat filled feed. (My Instagram feed is an almost perfect cat, antique and jewelry filled delight. I fight attempts of the algorithm to lead me astray.)

In the postcard kitty is perched in a wheel barrel which appears to be homemade from an old half barrel. Although this is a very fluffy feline and I would say there are a few years on this kit too, living an active farm life. For me there is just something wonderful about how this card comes together, sideways writing and all however.

Somewhat annoyingly Aunt Lisa completely ignores the presence of Mr. or Ms. Kitty on this card as she writes a rather mundane note, albeit in a lovely if occasionally illegible hand. To the best of my reading ability it appears to say, Dear Willie, Tell your brother that I had a personal…with a Lundberg today and he assured me that all would be satisfactory concerning the rubber heel. Hoping that…and is interesting and that papa’s cold is better. Love from Aunt Lisa. It was mailed on September 1, 1906 at 2:00 PM from Seattle, Washington to Master Willie Bailey, Port Townsend, Washington, Buf 244. The one cent stamp has gone missing. Alas, we are never to know kit’s name or any info.

Although cyanotypes appeal to me, they do not make up a significant portion of my collection. I have written once or twice about them (posts can be found here and here) and I have never had a chance to experiment with making them, although I gather that as early process photography goes they are pretty simple. (Iron compounds appear to be the active metal.) They were an inexpensive method of photography, invented in 1842 according to the internet, so the method was old hat by the time this one was produced in 1906.

I will close with a non-cat note that there is a gem of a little book I stumbled on years ago called Ipswich Days which is the reproduction of 41 cyanotypes made by Arthur Wesley Dow in 1899 and which I mentioned in one of the earlier posts. It is available inexpensively on Amazon (here at time of posting) and is an amazing reproduction of a slice of life and stroll through a small waterfront town at the time. Enjoy!