Dikran Khan Kelekian

This article describes an art dealer and collector. For a similarly named Turkish journalist and scholar, see Diran Kelekian .

Dikran Khan Kelekian (also Dikran Khan Kélékian , born as Dikran Garabed Kelekian ) (born January 19, 1868 in Kayseri , Ottoman Empire , † January 30, 1951 in New York City ) was an Armenian-American art dealer and art collector .

Life

Dikran Garabed Kelekian was born to the banker Garabed Kelekian and his wife Mariam in the Anatolian city ​​of Kayseri. The parents were Armenians of Iranian origin. He studied archeology at Robert College (now Boğaziçi Üniversitesi ) in Istanbul and later in Paris. Kelekian specialized in art from the Middle East and especially in medieval Islamic art . His interest was particularly in Persian art and he became an expert in Persian pottery, about which he published a book in 1909. In 1891 he opened his first gallery in Paris (first rue Rossini no. 10, then Place Vendôme no. 2). In 1892 a shop followed in Istanbul, which he ran together with his brother Kevork. A branch opened later in Cairo specialized in the trade in ancient Egyptian objects and the purchase of Coptic textiles.

Kelekian was appointed representative of the Persian Pavilion at the World's Columbian Exposition , the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago . For this purpose he first traveled to the United States and a little later settled in New York. In 1900 Kelekian was a member of the jury for the World Exhibition in Paris . At the World Exhibition in St. Louis in 1904, he again headed the Persian Pavilion as Commissioner General. At this exhibition he showed various pieces that he owned. Kelekian, who was highly regarded as a collector and dealer, first had a shop in New York at 598 Madison Avenue , which was later followed by a branch at 20 East 57th Street. He took American citizenship and became Persian Consul General in New York. For his services as consul, he received the honorary title of Khan from Mozaffar ad-Din Shah in 1902 , and from then on called himself Dikran Khan Kelekian.

In the following years he found important customers in the United States. For example, he put together extensive collections of ancient, Coptic and early Christian objects for Henry Walters , who later founded the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore. There are also numerous pieces in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York that found their way into the museum via Kelekian. Well-known objects include an Assyrian winged bull ( Lamassu ), which was donated to the museum by John D. Rockefeller Jr. Other well-known customers in the United States included JP Morgan , Isabella Stewart Gardner, and Henry and Louisine W. Havemeyer . In addition, he continued to exhibit his objects in Europe and, for example, showed a selection of his antiques in Munich in 1910.

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  Roman jug,
  1st century

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  Egyptian female figure,
  3rd century

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  Coptic textile,
  5th century

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  Persian pottery,
  13th century

In addition to the antique objects, Kelekian was interested and committed to contemporary art. For example, he had his son painted by the American painter Mary Cassatt and bought and sold numerous works from the 19th and 20th centuries through his gallery, including Édouard Manets Chez Tortoni ( Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum ), Georges Seurat's The Woman with the Powder Puff ( Courtauld Institute of Art ) or Vincent van Gogh 's Self-Portrait with Straw Hat ( Detroit Institute of Arts ). He was particularly committed to artists such as Henri Matisse , André Derain , Georges Rouault and Pablo Picasso , who made a significant contribution to their recognition in the United States. Kelekian was portrayed by numerous artists, including Milton Avery , Walt Kuhn , André Derain, Tadeusz Styka and John D. Graham .

As a patron he was on the board of the Armenian General Charity Union and founded an orphanage in Dörtyol in 1909 . Kelekian was married to Margaret Gumchian, who was also from Anatolia. The daughter Albine and the son Charles (1900–1982) come from this marriage. Charles Dikran Kelekian later joined his father's business and took over the art trade. The granddaughter Nanette continued to run the gallery until 1990.

Dikran Khan Kelekian died in 1951 after falling from the window of his suite in the New York Hotel St. Moritz . It remained unclear whether the 83-year-old man's fall was an accident or a suicide. In 2014/2015, the Metropolitan Museum in New York dedicated the exhibition Coptic Art, Dikran Kelekian, and Milton Avery to Dikran Khan Kelekian .

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  Mary Cassatt:
  Charles Dikran Kelekian

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  Edouard Manet:
  Chez Tortoni

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  Georges Seurat,
  The Woman with the Powder Puff

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  Vincent van Gogh:
  Self-Portrait with a Straw Hat

Publications

• Dikran Khan Kelekian: The Potteries of Persia, being a brief history of the art of ceramics in the Near East . H. Clarke, Paris 1909.

Web links

• Short Biography - National Portrait Gallery, Washington (English)
• Biography in the Dictionnaire des orientalistes de langue française (French)
• Information about the exhibition Coptic Art, Dikran Kelekian, and Milton Avery (English)