The towering feline monoliths were taken down on Tuesday, March 26th, in San Francisco’s Hayes Valley after over a year of enspelling passersby.
When we reported on the San Francisco Arts Commission (SFAC) installing a sextet of vocalizing cat statues in SF in 2022, readers quickly reached out with pictures and experience interacting with the 3D-printed piece of public artwork. The cats, each towering nine feet tall and regularly emitting a haunting hum — a purr, as some noted — glowed in the night inside Patricia’s Green in SF’s Hayes Valley neighborhood.
They were beacons of sorts, beloved by young and old, residents and tourists alike.
These “Catoliths” were arranged in not just a simple, mundane, meaningless circle; their exact placement symbolized the concept of “Holofelinity” — of “Universal Cat Consciousness.” It was a tongue-in-cheek way to convey the notion that all sentient beings, a cohort that includes us humans, are interconnected to each other. And, thus, we can’t continue thriving and living and being to the highest degree unless we all are.
That universality did, however, have an expiration date. Yesterday, March 26th, after sixteen months of summoning joy and awe on the 0.41-acre urban greenspace, the adored artwork was taken down.
“Some said it’s the end of an era,” reads an Instagram post announcing the display’s dismantling. “16 months of Cathenge at Patricia’s Green and the Catoliths came down today.”
The ten-slide post showed the Catlothis bathed in a Spring of Deception sunset, each upright feline collared with a gem-like stone. Red construction tape encircled the outdoor exhibit as workers… well, worked on removing it from the concrete area. The complete removal of the six felines left only the bases they perched upright on; small mounting hardware echoed the eeriness of stumps left from freshly cut trees.
“Erotica, Solara, and the rest of the ancient Cat Priestesses of Pussiopolis who stood sentinel in the dog park central to Hayes Valley have departed leaving only the concrete bases that anchored them,” continued the post published by [at]cathenge_cat_temple, before hinting that the installation might appear elsewhere — “[where] will they appear next?? NYC? Miami? Pittsburgh or DC?”
“Proposals for all of the above are in the works,” the post continues. “ I’m open to further suggestions.’
TBD on what’s coming next to the platform, but here’s hoping it roars to life with equal vigor.
