"On croit toujours que la pensée, qui est une force, touche son but aussi bien qu'un message écrit."

Fine autograph letter signed by Colette addressed to her friend Bolette Natanson. Two pages written in ink on blue headed paper from the Marignan building, the writer's residence between 1936 and 1938. Transverse folds inherent to the folding of the letter for mailing.
Moving letter addressed by Colette to her close friend following the death of her father Alexandre Natanson: "[...] ce dimanche va être un dimanche bien pénible. Je t'écris à l'heure juste où tu conduis ton père." ["this Sunday is going to be a very painful Sunday. I am writing to you at the very moment when you are laying your father to rest."] Conscious of the suffering and "chagrin" ["grief"] of her "chère Bolette" ["dear Bolette"], she affectionately offers her support "On croit toujours que la pensée, qui est une force, touche son but aussi bien qu'un message écrit." ["We always believe that thought, which is a force, reaches its target as well as a written message."], ending her letter with a very beautiful declaration: "Beaucoup de visages humains se penchent vers le tien et tu ne les aimes pas tous. Le mien, que tu ne verras pas, te suit de loin et s'inquiète de toi." ["Many human faces lean toward yours and you do not love them all. Mine, which you will not see, follows you from afar and worries about you."] Bolette would commit suicide a few months later.
Having evolved since her earliest childhood in artistic circles - she was the daughter of Alexandre and the niece of Thadée Natanson, the creators of the famous Revue Blanche - Bolette Natanson (1892-1936) became friends with Jean Cocteau, Raymond Radiguet, Georges Auric, Jean Hugo and also Colette.
Passionate about couture, she left Paris for the United States with Misia Sert, a great friend of Coco Chanel, and was hired at Goodman. With her husband Jean-Charles Moreux, they created in 1929 the gallery Les Cadres on boulevard Saint-Honoré and frequented numerous artists and intellectuals. Their success was immediate and they multiplied their projects: the creation of the fireplace for Winnaretta de Polignac, the decoration of the château de Maulny, the arrangement of Baron de Rothschild's private mansion, the creation of frames for industrialist Bernard Reichenbach and finally the creation of the storefront for Colette's beauty institute in 1932. Bolette Natanson also framed the works of her prestigious painter friends: Bonnard, Braque, Picasso, Vuillard, Man Ray, André Dunoyer de Segonzac, etc. Despite this meteoric rise, she would end her life in December 1936, a few months after her father's death.