Babou was a pet

ocelot The ocelot (''Leopardus pardalis'') is a medium-sized spotted Felidae, wild cat that reaches at the shoulders and weighs between on average. It is native to the southwestern United States, Mexico, Central America, Central and South America, ...

and frequent companion of the surrealist artist

Salvador Dalí Salvador Domingo Felipe Jacinto Dalí i Domènech, Marquess of Dalí of Púbol (11 May 190423 January 1989), known as Salvador Dalí ( ; ; ), was a Spanish Surrealism, surrealist artist renowned for his technical skill, precise draftsmanship, ...

in the 1960s. A cat lover, Dalí claimed to have been given the animal by the head of state of Colombia. Babou's date of death is unknown.

Life with Dalí

In the 1960s, Babou was frequently seen with Dalí, who claimed to have been given the wild ocelot by the head of state of Colombia. Dalí had always been a cat lover and had an interest in exotic animals. He enjoyed a visual pun and would sometimes wear a cat pattern or coloured coat when travelling with Babou. In 1969, he was photographed leaving a Paris metro station with an

anteater Anteaters are the four extant mammal species in the suborder Vermilingua (meaning "worm tongue"), commonly known for eating ants and termites. The individual species have other names in English and other languages. Together with sloths, they ar ...

on a lead. For a time in the 1960s, Dalí was more often than not accompanied by Babou. In a restaurant in Manhattan, although Babou's leash was tethered to the table, a fellow diner became quite alarmed until Dalí assured her that Babou was an ordinary cat “painted over in an op art design." On another occasion, when Babou and Dalí were visiting a gallery in Paris, Babou "made a nuisance" on some valuable 17th-century lithographs. Dalí claimed that the connection with him could only increase their value and the dealer increased the price of the lithographs by 50%. Dalí also agreed to sell the dealer a batch of his lithographs to placate him. In 1970, Robert Wernick reported in ''

Life Life, also known as biota, refers to matter that has biological processes, such as Cell signaling, signaling and self-sustaining processes. It is defined descriptively by the capacity for homeostasis, Structure#Biological, organisation, met ...

'' magazine that Babou had a younger companion named Bouba who were led into the hotel Meurice on a leash by one of Dali's assistants and made sick by the hotel's revolving doors. The Meurice was a luxury hotel in Paris since 1815, where Dalí was a regular guest for 30 years in its best known suite, the Royal Suite, which had been home to King

Alfonso XIII Alfonso XIII (Spanish language, Spanish: ''Alfonso León Fernando María Jaime Isidro Pascual Antonio de Borbón y Habsburgo-Lorena''; French language, French: ''Alphonse Léon Ferdinand Marie Jacques Isidore Pascal Antoine de Bourbon''; 17 May ...

during his exile from Spain. Writing in his memoirs, the actor Carlos Lozano (a friend of Dalí) stated, “I only saw the ocelot smile once, the day it escaped and sent the guests at the Meurice scurrying like rats for cover.” Babou also accompanied Dalí on a transatlantic crossing on the '' SS France''.

References

{{Reflist Cats in the United States Individual felines Salvador Dalí