The cat 

Théophile Alexandre Steinlen made this drawing of a cat, likely in France, sometime around the turn of the 20th century. Cats were common in the art of this period, often appearing in domestic scenes that reinforced the gendered division of public and private life. But Steinlen's cats are different. The artist lived in Montmartre and was closely associated with the anarchist subculture of Paris. His work appeared most often in politically engaged journals and newspapers. Here, the quick strokes of the charcoal suggest movement, capturing the animal's predatory instincts and nervous energy. The cat's sleek, self-possessed independence then becomes a potent symbol of the artist's own Bohemian freedom, and a subtle challenge to the bourgeois values of the French Third Republic. To know more about the image, one might research the illustrated press in France at the time. After all, context is everything.