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 raised her eyebrows at the sight of me, jumped to the ground, and began her wild-cat-like stroll from door to window, from window to door, with that way of turning and changing feet, against the obstacle, which belongs to her and all her brothers. But her master threw her a crumpled ball of paper, and she began to laugh, with an enormous leap, an expenditure of her unused strength, which showed her in all her splendor. She was as large as a spaniel, with long, muscular thighs attached to a broad loin, a narrower forequarters, a rather small head, topped with white-furred ears, painted on the outside with black and gray designs reminiscent of those that decorate the wings of twilight butterflies. A small and disdainful jaw, whiskers as stiff as the dry grass of the dunes, and amber eyes framed in black, eyes with a gaze as pure as their color, eyes that never wavered in the face of human gaze, eyes that never lied… One day, I wanted to count the black spots that embroidered her coat, the color of wheat on her back and head, ivory white on her belly; I could not.

“She comes from Chad,” her owner told me. “She could also be from Asia. She’s probably an ounce. Her name is Bâ-Tou, which means ‘the cat,’ and she’s 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.