62 - BEARD PETER (1938–2020) FEMALE GERENUK ON THE TIVA RIVER IN TSAVO NORTH NEAR KATHEMULA AS THE HUNT COMES TO AN END. Silver gelatin photographic print with ink, drawings, collage of photographs and printed clippings, applied plant elements, and mixed-media interventions. 82 x 64.50 cm. Signed and titled (unique work) PROVENANCE Work donated by the artist to the current owner Private collection, Italy REFERENCE BIBLIOGRAPHY Peter Beard: The End of the Game, Taschen, 2008, p. 147, variant; Peter Beard, Taschen, 2008, plate 267, variant. Blending photography, diary entries, collage, and painterly interventions, Peter Beard’s work constructs a language in which the documentation of African nature is transformed into an autobiographical and visual narrative. Having settled in Kenya in the early 1960s, Beard spent years photographing the landscape and wildlife of East Africa, while simultaneously developing a vast archive of images, notes, clippings, and materials collected during his travels.*Female Gerenuk on the Tiva in Tsavo North Near Kathemula for The End of the Game* belongs to one of the most representative groups of works in this body of research. At the center of the composition is the gerenuk photographed in the Tsavo region, while the artist transforms the image through text, drawings, photographs, clippings, and applied materials. The photograph thus loses its character as a mere document to become a unique object, constructed through successive layers of memory and experience.The reference to *The End of the Game* is central. First published in 1965, the book is one of Beard’s seminal projects and brings together photographs, documents, and testimonies dedicated to the transformation of East Africa and the progressive destruction of its ecosystem. In subsequent works related to the project, Beard further expands this artistic language, bringing together photography, handwritten text, drawing, and collage in densely layered compositions.In this work, this diary-like quality is particularly evident: images of elephants, lions, and other animals, typographic fragments, drawings, and natural materials accumulate around the isolated figure of the gerenuk. Also featured is the quote attributed to Karen Blixen, “What business had I ever, to set my heart on Africa?”, a further reference to Beard’s personal and cultural connection to the African continent. The result is a sort of monumental diary page, in which individual experience, memory, and reflection on the fragility of the natural world become inseparable. Current context