Two photographs of COLETTE playing tenderly with her cat.

Sidonie Gabrielle Colette , known as COLETTE (1873.1954)

Set of two original photographs.

Vintage silver gelatin prints – probably unique – depicting Colette playing with her cat Bâ-Tou, a gift from her friend Berthelot.

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There's no need to elaborate further on Colette's love for cats. Let's simply note that Philippe Berthelot gave her a female serval from Chad in 1921, named Bâ-Tou:

« She brought together her eyebrows at the sight of me, jumped to the ground and began her wild walk, from the door to the window, from the window to the door, with this way of turning and changing feet, against the obstacle, which belongs to her and all her brothers. But her master threw her a ball of crumpled paper and she began to laugh, with a disproportionate leap, an expenditure of her unused strength, which showed her in all her splendor. She was as tall as a spaniel dog, her thighs long and muscular attached to a broad kidney, her forequarters narrower, her head quite small, topped with ears lined with white, painted, on the outside, with black and gray designs. reminiscent of those which decorate the wings of twilight butterflies. A small and disdainful jaw, mustaches as stiff as the dry grass of the dunes, and amber eyes set in black, eyes with a look as pure as their color, eyes which never weakened before the human gaze, eyes who have never lied... One day, I wanted to count the black spots that embroidered her dress, the color of wheat on the back and head, ivory white on the stomach; I could not.

– She comes from Chad, her master told me. It could also come from Asia. It's an ounce, no doubt. Her name is Bâ-Tou, which means “the cat”, and she is twenty months old. »

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Circa 1920.

Format: Approximately 10 x 13 cm for each photo.

Handwritten annotations and collector's stamp on the back.