EDMUND DE WAAL (b.1964)
Letters to Camondo. London: Chatto & Windus, 2021.
Annotated first edition, with associated gilded porcelain tile, of a sequence of imagined letters to art collector Count Moïse de Camondo. Count de Camondo was the owner of a fine Parisian house which he filled with an extraordinary collection of French eighteenth-century art. De Waal’s 58 letters tell the story of the Count’s life and death, and his exceptional collection which exists unchanged to this day as the Musée Nissim de Camondo – a memorial to his son who was killed in the First World War. The author’s 721 words of annotations – added between lines of text, or in the margins, or perpendicular to the printed text – transcribe passages from the letters, while other passages on thirty pages are underlined or partially illuminated by 24ct gold leaf.

The porcelain tile is a part reproduction of a hand-written letter by the artist, the text of which is included in the book as letter II, addressed to Count Moïse de Camondo, beginning ‘Dear friend, I am making an archive of your archive.’

Octavo. Original orange boards with blindstamped monogram, printed dust jacket; [together with:] gold leaf on porcelain tile with the Camondo label affixed to the reverse 7¹⁄₄ x 4⁷⁄₈in. (18.4 x 12.4cm.) Executed in 2022; housed together in a black cloth archive box with a lead fold with embossed seal 13³⁄₈ x 9⁵⁄₈ x 2¹⁄₂in. (34 x 24.5 x 6.5cm.)

Buyer’s premium is payable, with a significant portion donated by Christie’s to English PEN, but note that no VAT is payable on hammer price or buyer’s premium.
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