Creating a Purr-fectly Whimsical Jewelry Set for SIA Cat Symphony

Salazar at 14 Shades of Grey is the curator for this round of Style Imitating Art (SIA), and she selected 1868 drawing "Katzensymphonie" (Cat Symphony) by Austrian artist Moritz von Schwind. She chose this artwork because "a symphony of black cats just fits the bill" of "something Halloween-related without being too obvious." The artist created this work as a gift for his friend and fellow member of Die Schwarzen Katzen (Black Cats) drinking club Joseph Joachim to celebrate Joachim's appointment as director of the Berlin University of Music. As Marsha and Shelbee relate, the artist joked that Joachim "confesses that is he is incapable of playing it - this wizard on the violin!"

Source: https://14shadesofgrey.wordpress.com/

It's rare for me to have such an immediate thought as to how I want to interpret an artwork for SIA as I did for this playful violin "sonata." I knew I wanted to wear a long-sleeved t-shirt in ivory with black horizontal lines to represent the musical staff paper plus cat jewelry to represent the cats. But my "cat jewelry" is actually very limited, despite how much I love cats; I pulled out this black glass and mixed metal bracelet with a cat charm (described in this SIA post from almost exactly 3 years ago) but that wasn't going to be enough on its own.

Luckily, I had two bead boxes to hand that I could combine to create jewelry to the theme: the October Bargain Bead Box with a cat pendant, two cat charms, and two cat connectors; and the August Curated Bead Box with many treble clef and musical note charms. I went into my own charm stash and pulled out all the cat and music charms I could find.

I made a set of three layering necklaces. I made the Cat Symphony charm necklace first - the middle one in the photo below - using a combination of cat and music charms in gold, silver, and black or white with gold plus some spotted glass beads. Next I made the long necklace...and that was actually something of a time-consuming challenge for me because although the four black cats and the two silver cat-and-moon pieces were connectors, the silver treble clefs were charms - i.e., they had a loop at the top but not at the bottom. So I had to figure out a way to wire wrap the bottom of the treble clef to connect the next piece of the necklace. It took me several attempts to figure out what worked and looked good to me, but I did eventually get a design that I liked. Last I made the short necklace using black agate and obsidian beads with a lampwork focal to coordinate with the Cat Symphony duo, but it doesn't have any cat or music motifs in it so it can also serve as a stand-alone piece as well. I also made two super easy pairs of earrings: one with the larger cat/moon charms from the October bead box (a more general cat pair), and one in which I combined silver cat and music note charms with a jump ring (very much the Cat Symphony pair).

Here's how the layered necklaces looked with my striped t-shirt. I'd forgotten what a deep scoop neck this t-shirt has, so the two shorter necklaces rested above the neckline rather than on top of the stripes, but I still think it gave some good Cat Symphony vibes with only the long necklace crossing over the lines.

OOTD 11/3/25

To finish off the outfit, I kept things really simple with straight leg black jeans and a lightweight black cardigan vest. I don't usually do a full tuck of my tops, but I did this time to keep the "musical staff paper" of the t-shirt running straight across, and it gave me some 1980s/90s vibes.

Of course I had to wear my Adidas sneakers with the correct color scheme and additional stripey-ness.

My daily bracelet stack (which was not so blurry in real life, hah) started with the cat bracelet, which I supplemented with various white, ivory, and black-and-white bracelets to create a 5 bracelet stack. {stretch bracelet tutorial} {bicone paper bead tutorial} {tube paper bead tutorial}

I chose to wear the silver cat-and-musical-note charm earrings for the full-on Cat Symphony look. By happy coincidence, my new black-and-gold glasses that I picked up on Halloween matched this outfit perfectly, complete with a cat-eye shape.

After over a decade of wearing more minimalist metal eyeglasses - 6 years in rose gold and light brown, and several years in plain gold before that - the darker glasses are very different! But the store didn't have any gold or rose gold eyeglasses that checked my boxes: the right size/shape was the wrong color (too bright of a gold) and the right color was the wrong size/shape (too narrow at the eyes - I was definitely in the mood for wider glasses with a more pronounced cat-eye effect).

So I tried out some darker pairs, and I liked the Bold Brow-line energy and the greater contrast to my skin and hair color. I know that the gold, soft gold, brown, and tortoiseshell I've worn in the past are more commonly recommended for those of us with warm/golden blonde hair and overall "soft" coloration, but I guess I was in the mood for a change to a glasses look that is more strong and noticeable. I find the overall effect of these glasses to be a pleasing combination of Legolas's "Blonde with Dark Brows" aesthetic and my Brainy Bunny plate's "Girl in Serious Glasses" vibe.

Sources: Pinterest (left); Ebay (right)

Now for the main event: revealing our Rabbit Imitating Art selection! Was there any doubt that a pure black bunny would be our choice for this challenge? This ultra-soft black mini rex rabbit stole my heart right away, and I knew that he'd make a wonderfully sumptuous addition to our artwork, but he wasn't so sure about this idea!

As he hesitantly entered the drawing, he thought, "She keeps calling it the 'Cat Symphony' but as I read this so-called sonata, it's clear that it's less Katzensymphonie than Katzenmusik - a caterwauling cacophony! With my sensitive hearing, how will I withstand these unpleasant and discordant sounds? I can relax into soft, repetitive rhythms and low-volume, gentle music, but loud, jarring noise turns my anxiety dial up to 11!"

But then it hit him, a solution to all the problems of this crazy cat music: "One by one, you replace each black cat with a black rabbit! As the number of caterwauling cats decreases, substituted by quiet bunnies, the NOISE! NOISE! NOISE! abates, until there are only rabbits on the page and blessed silence can be heard. Time to add some carrots (or caret-like marcato symbols?) to pull the bunnies into the music! Time to place some catnip, balls of yarn, stuffed mice, crinkle balls, and feather wands around the edges of the drawing to entice the cats away! By this method, silent music will be achieved, Schwind's strident, shrill, screeching aspirations be damned!"

Artwork "improved" with rabbit

In traditional music history, silent music is described as the invention of various humans. For example, the first completely silent musical composition is believed to have been written by the French humorist Alponse Allais; his 1897 piece "Funeral March for the Obsequies of a Great Deaf Man" consists of 24 blank measures. In 1919, Dadaist Erwin Schulhoff wrote a 5 movement work in which the middle movement "was silent, although fully written out in the score...[It] consisted of one page in impossible time signatures, with each measure filled out with rests" (source). John Cage later created serious entirely silent musical works that were widely performed, such as his landmark 1952 composition 4'33", with the intent that audiences listen to the ambient noise around them.

But the history of the Cat Symphony...or should I say, Rabbit Symphony...of 1868 demonstrates that silent music could easily predate any of these human artists. Just how far back does silent music go? Stay tuned for further developments into my research project "An Investigation into the Non-Human Origins of Silent Music (Now With Extra Carrots)."

Thanks for joining me today for this Style Imitating Art + Rabbit Imitating (and Improving) Art post!

To see other outfit interpretations of this artwork, check out the review on 14 Shades of Grey.

Do you ever wear full-on black-and-white outfits with no other colors? Do you have any cat clothing, jewelry, or other accessories? How about items with a musical motif? If you wear glasses, do you prefer a more minimalist/subtle pair of glasses or something bolder or higher contrast? Had you heard of John Cale's silent 4'33" musical composition before?

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