Where does the name come from?

Always quote your sources, apparently. The name derives from one of Rudyard Kipling's "Just So Stories" for children. Rather than being a lonely figure, the eponymous cat is an independent spirit who refuses to sell his freedom.

"I am the cat who walks by himself, and all places are alike to me..."

You can read the original here: 4umi.com

...and the Artwork?

The artwork comes from the Krazy Kat cartoons of George Herriman. These cartoons ran through the early part of the last century and although not commercially successful, they proved popular with contemporary eccentrics and intelectuals such as e e cummings. The strips are set in the weird and wonderful Coconino County, a stylized Arizona, and the scenery shifts from frame to frame around the characters. The plots centre around the love triangle of Krazy, Ofissa Bull Pup and Ignatz mouse. Krazy Kat is a guilless ingenue who wanders around blissfuly ignorant of the iniquities of others, particularly Ignatz mouse whom he adores but who in return holds Krazy in utter contempt and expresses this by constantly hurling bricks at his head. Ofissa Pup dotes on Krazy, and pursues Ignatz mouse with a single minded obstinacy, despite Krazy interpreting Ignatz' assaults as signs of affection and openly courting them. Anyway, you can see some of the strips here

...and lastly

The Cat is adorned down his cabin sides with two commonly occuring motifs in the Krazy Kat strips. The zig zag is purely decorative, but the other is a Navajo medicine wheel. The medicine wheel is interpreted as representing four paths, health and strength, illness and infirmity, wealth and poverty. A person is required to walk all the paths and complete the wheel on the journey towards becoming a "human being". So now you know.

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