\"artist and revolutionary: panos terlemezian (1865-1941) as an ottoman armenian...

$: \"Artist and Revolutionary: Panos Terlemezian (1865-1941) as an Ottoman Armenian Painter,\" Études arméniennes contemporaines, no. 6, December (2015): 111-153$
�� *�� !�� "��#��$�%�$

&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

'�(�� )�

�� &&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

� �� !�� "� �� # ��

$�� "�� %��%�� &%'$(��)*)((��+,��+-,./�

&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

$�� 0�1��!��2H- ��$�� 34�,��!� ��1��5��- ��,�� H6�� 7)��8��9H:H;<=>��=<�� ;<=9��==�� ;<=9��+$�H4"��4??�� ?@AB

C�� 4�D� ��"��' � ��+0-D"��4??�� "��4??EEE� ��

F�� 4�"��4??�� ?@AB%�� D� ��"��' � ��G+0-D

Artist and Revolutionary:Panos Terlemezian

as an Ottoman Armenian Painter*

GIZEM TONGOSt. John’s College, University of Oxford

In 1915, the Ottoman Armenian artist Panos Terlemezian (1865-1941)1 painted a remarkable landscape knownas Sipan Mountain from Ktuts Island (!"#$%!$&' ()*+, (-.*+,) [see figure 1, p. 233].

Long before Terlemezian painted the work, theBritish traveller H.F.B. Lynch (1862-1913) wrote ofthe same scenery: “nature alone has made the most ofexceptional opportunities; and Sipan, with this plainon one flank and the lake of Van upon the other, isworthy to rank among the most beautiful objects inthe natural world.”2 To convey a sense of this beauty,Terlemezian has placed the highest mountain of hisbirthplace, Van, firmly in the background of the can-vas lending a rigid symmetry to his composition. Thegigantic snow-topped mountain dominates the can-vas, cleaving the cloudy blue skies, and tracing a lineatop the deep azure of Lake Van and the rocky shoreon which he stood to paint. The serenity of thecerulean sky and the translucent turquoise lake con-trast with the greens, browns, and creams of theshore’s uneven forms. Although Ktuts Island was

Panos Terlemezian as an Ottoman Armenian Painter Études arméniennes contemporaines

* The research for this paperhas been generously fundedby the Hrant Dink Founda-tion and the Khalili ResearchCentre, who enabled myresearch trip to Armenia inthe summer of 2014. I amalso thankful to the LordDulverton Trust at the Uni-versity of Oxford and OrientInstitut Istanbul who havesupported the research andwriting process. I would liketo thank the following col-leagues and friends for theirhelp, suggestions, and cri-tiques: Ari Şekeryan, MeriKirakosyan, and Yan OverfieldShaw were absolutely crucialto the successful outcome ofthis paper. I am also thankfulto Theo van Lint, DavidZakarian, Rouben Galichian,Irvin Cemil Schick, BarışZeren, Akif Ercihan Yerlioğlu,

111

home to a fifteenth-century Armenian Monastery, Terlemezian chose toomit both this and the island’s regular inhabitants, the seagulls. In fact,the only moving or ephemeral thing in the entire composition is a littlewhite boat on the horizon, formed with a short, controlled flick of thepalette knife. Terlemezian’s 1915 Sipan Mountain is a perfect and peace-ful landscape in which none of the “fragments” of the on-going warappear on the canvas; on the contrary, it depicts a moment of stillnessand tranquillity in which Van appears as a paradise, devoid of signs ofwar. For a modern viewer, the painting arouses ambivalent feelings, as weimagine Terlemezian looking at this beloved landscape for perhaps the

last time, presenting posterity and his future self withan ever-so-beautiful moment of his lost orunachieved homeland.

Born in the Ottoman city of Van in 1865,Terlemezian became both an important political fig-ure and a noted painter. He was exiled and impris-oned in the empire and abroad for his activities as anArmenian revolutionary against the absolutist regimeof Sultan Abdulhamid II (r. 1876-1909). In exile, atthe late age of thirty, Terlemezian received academicart training in St. Petersburg, continuing later inParis at the Académie Julian. Whilst most OttomanArmenian painters were familiar with one “home”(Istanbul) and two cultural centres at most (Istanbuland Paris, or Rome), Terlemezian would eventuallyexhibit works in cities as diverse as Paris, Tbilisi,Munich, Istanbul, New York, and Yerevan. In fact, inexile and perhaps because of exile, Terlemezian seemsat times like what George Steiner calls an “extraterri-torial” artist; an artist who was “unhoused” and “awanderer.”3 Initially a committed Realist painter, he

travelled and painted extensively in Anatolia, the Caucasus, and Europe,recording landscapes, rural scenes, and the life of ordinary people.During the Armenian Genocide of 1915, Terlemezian was one of themilitary leaders of the Van Uprising against the Ottoman army. Havingsurvived the genocide, he retreated to the Caucasus until the end of thewar. He returned to Istanbul during the Armistice Period, and later

Eda Özel, Melissa Bilal, andBurcu Yıldız. I also thank theanonymous reviewers forinsightful and detailed com-ments. All remaining errorsare mine.1. Terlemezian’s name alsoappears as “Fanos PogosovichTerlemezian” in Russiansources. See, for example,Great Soviet Encyclopedia,1980, p. 524. In this paper,Armenian names are trans-lated based on EasternArmenian phonetics, unlessthe names of people, newspa-pers, or places are acceptedwith their traditionalWestern Armenian names. 2. H. F. B. Lynch, 1901,p. 33. Lynch visited Armeniatwice, first in 1893-1894 andlater in 1898.3. G. Steiner, 1971.

112

GIZEM TONGOÉtudes arméniennes contemporaines

stayed briefly in New York. Terlemezian eventually settled in SovietArmenia in 1928, and there became one of the most celebrated paintersin Armenian history. When he died in 1941 in Yerevan, he left behindmore than a thousand paintings, drawings, and sketches including land-scapes, portraits, and still lifes, most of which he donated to the NationalGallery of Armenia. Today, Terlemezian is remem-bered among Armenian art historians as “a master oflandscape,”4 and “one of the most prominent repre-sentatives of the realistic direction in Armenian art,”5

a revolutionist “against the absolutist regime ofSultan Abdülhamid II,”6 and a “participant in theheroic self-defence of Van.”7

This paper explores Terlemezian’s “initial identi-ty” as an Ottoman Armenian painter, situating himwithin both the history of the late-Ottoman Empirein which he became a revolutionary, and within theinternational art world of the late nineteenth- andearly twentieth century with which he interacted ashe was developing as an artist. For an art historian,Termezian’s life, art, and politics raise absorbing andchallenging questions about the complex relationshipbetween his political and aesthetic positions; in otherwords, how Terlemezian’s revolutionary politicsshaped the development of his art. Focusing on theperiod 1885-1915, this paper draws on readings ofhis early artworks supplemented by memoirs8 andcontemporary accounts to situate Terlemezian in abroad cultural and historical matrix. This context isunderstood as non-linear, complex, and fragile, and,hence, seeks to go beyond the so-calledOttoman/Armenian divide to understand the artistand his art as an integral part of a turbulent period inmodern Ottoman art, in the cultural history of thelate-Ottoman Empire, and in world art history.

I start by engaging the respective marginalisation and canonization ofTerlemezian’s work in Turkish and Armenian art history writing. I thenintroduce Terlemezian’s trajectories as a revolutionary and as an artist:

4. M. Saris, 2005, p. 65.5. “/0&1$&203)" 40$-5"3)$/$% *+--*+67$%$/$%$2*& %0&/$7$,*+-,"8 9$%*3”, M. Kirakosyan,2014, p. 4.6. G. Kürkman, 2004, p. 804. 7. S. Khachatryan, 2010, p. 20. 8. In this study, I refer to twomemoirs by the artist: hismemoirs about his friendGomidas, published inYerevan in 1930 as part of acollection of memoirs forGomidas, which has beentranslated from EasternArmenian to Turkish byMelissa Bilal and BurcuYıldız. I have also consultedTerlemezian’s personal mem-oirs as they appear in MeriKirakosyan’s comprehensive2014 monograph, based onher PhD thesis, a remarkablepiece of archival research.Terlemezian started to writehis memoirs as late as 1935,when he was 70 years old;sadly, he had not finishedthem when he died in 1941.Terlemezian’s memoirs arekept at the National Galleryof Armenia.

Études arméniennes contemporainesPanos Terlemezian as an Ottoman Armenian Painter

113


his engagement with the Armenakan movement in the city of Van; hisimprisonment and exile under the regime of Sultan Abdülhamid II; hisart training in St. Petersburg and Paris; and his ties with prevailing artis-tic traditions. In the third part, I explore Terlemezian’s transformationinto a popular and established painter in the Istanbul art world: his con-tributions to local and international art exhibitions and his relationshipwith the Ottoman cultural elite and the art market in the imperial capi-tal between the Second Constitutional Revolution and the First WorldWar. The fourth section takes up the complex relationship between artand politics, and I read a selection of Terlemezian’s paintings for theirarticulations of the contested meanings of identity, the other, and war.The paper ends where it began, reading his 1915 work Sipan Mountainfrom Ktuts Island; a deep breath before the storm of events that wouldfinally shake apart the artist’s identity as an Ottoman Armenian painter.

Terlemezian’s story points to a cosmopolitan and integrated artworld in Ottoman Istanbul, but only in brief periods of historical oppor-tunity, suggesting how the political agendas of a state can create extraor-dinary circumstance in an artist’s life. Perhaps Terlemezian’s story canalso encourage fresh insights, without prejudices, into what has beeneither misunderstood or deliberately distorted on the pages of Turkishand Armenian (art) history.

SILENCING THE PAST:(RE)WRITING TERLEMEZIAN IN TURKEY AND ARMENIA

After the foundation of the Turkish Republic in 1923, the first gen-eration of Turkish art historians wrote the history of modernOttoman/Turkish art during the one-party government (1925-1945).They were mostly painters who had themselves been through the changeof regime from an officially multicultural empire to a purportedly mono-cultural republic. Their studies were based on biographical facts andsketches and also on direct experience of the art world they represented.Writing in a country which adamantly constructed itself as a counter-model to the Ottoman Empire, the challenge for early-Republican arthistorians was to write about the art of a “tainted” and “un-Modern”empire using the ruthlessly homogenising and modernising terminolo-gies and ideologies of the new nation-state. The new patriotic canons

114


and narratives they constructed excluded the contributions of non-Turkish and non-Muslim Ottomans, many of whom had been consid-ered enemy combatants during the cataclysms leading to the formationof the Republic. The second generation were active between the 1950sand 1970s. Their work on Ottoman painters (whom they ahistoricallycalled “Turkish”) was utterly dependant on sources published by the firstgeneration, as most writers could not work with materials written beforethe alphabet reform of 1928, when the Arabic script was replaced by theLatin alphabet. It is true that the studies of the second generation, likethose of the first, aimed to present the development of modern art inTurkey. Nonetheless, like the previous generation, their reaction againstexclusivist Eurocentric (mostly Franco-centric) modern art historiogra-phy led them to create an equally exclusivist nationalist discourse. Riotsagainst non-Muslims also took place in this period, including thepogroms of 6-7 September 1955 against the Greek population ofIstanbul, leading to a massive wave of emigration for many non-Muslimsin Turkey. As Zeynep Yasa-Yaman describes, in this repressive environ-ment, the small number of remaining non-Muslim artists “gradually dis-appeared from the stage of art; entirely Turkified, the history of modernart thus took on a sterile, national appearance.”9 The political imperativeto “Turkify” left a visible impact on art history writing, which could thennot go far from these “sterile” exclusions. Reacting against a repressiveatmosphere of nationalism and militarism, the generation of art histori-ans writing in the 1980s and 1990s took an interest in the Ottoman pastdenied by early-Republican historiography. These studies explored howlocal Westernisation programmes in the empire created and later affec-ted “modern” Ottoman visual culture. Though non-Muslim names started to be mentioned now andthen, most scholarship focussed on revising views of Osman Hamdi Bey(1842-1910), Şeker Ahmed Paşa (1841-1907), and the “TurkishImpressionists”. These were indeed significant figures deserving closeattention, but their milieu included many other important artists,among them a considerable number of Ottoman Armenian andOttoman Greek artists who contributed much to the artistic life at thetime and to the development of modern art in the empire.

Our current writing on modern Ottoman/Turkish art is obliged toconfront new questions about visual culture posed in the aftermath of

9. Z. Yasa-Yaman, 2011, p. 43.

115

postmodern, feminist, and postcolonial theory.10 Inrecent years, critical attention has focused on hownationalist thinking in Turkish history has been sup-ported and promoted by official policies, culturalinstitutions, and nationally-oriented art histories.11

As such, studies on Ottoman Armenian painters byscholars like Garo Kürkman12 and Mayda Saris,13 andart historians like Vazken Khatchig Davidian14 areexamples of the move towards inclusive modern arthistories. Yet, as Davidian has remarked, “the intro-duction of the voices of other Ottoman artists, suchas Greeks, Levantines, Jews etc., into the discourse isstill lacking.”15 Of course, the question is not oneabout which non-Muslim artist should be added tothe canon but about canon formation per se and itspolitical determinants. The case of Terlemezian– sine qua non of art history in Armenia but anathe-ma to it in Turkey – brings us face to face with thesedeterminants.

In Armenia, another country formed after theconvulsions of the First World War, art historianswere also of great importance in the construction of a

national identity.16 Yet, unlike in Turkey where Republicanism reliedupon ethno-nationalism, the long period of Soviet rule in Armenia from1920 to 1991 meant that Armenian art historians could not describeartists born as Ottoman Armenians or Russian Armenians as“Armenian” tout court, or even mention the genocide, without arousingsuspicions of separatism. After he moved to Soviet Armenia in 1928, arthistorians classified Terlemezian as a Russian Armenian artist, or even asa Russian one. Eghishe Martikyan’s 1964 monograph, for instance,divides his œuvre into two periods, pre-Soviet and Soviet, and praises hiscontribution to the development of Soviet art.17 A turning point forSoviet Armenia came on 24 April 1965, when thousands in Yerevangathered to demonstrate the fiftieth anniversary of the 1915 deporta-tions and mass murders. As Ronald Grigor Suny argues, the demonstra-tion itself was the “first major outbreak of dissident nationalism withinSoviet Armenia,” after a long period of “forced Russification” under

10. Publications on modernOttoman painting by WendyShaw and Mary Roberts areexamples of contributionsinformed by recent criticalinsights offered by postcolo-nial theory. W. Shaw, 2011;M. Roberts, 2015.11. On the problem ofTurkish art history writingand how it has marginalisedOttoman Armenian pain-ters, see, B. Kum, 2015,pp. 258-286. 12. G. Kürkman, 2004.13. M. Saris, 2005; and, also,M. Saris, 2010.14. V.K. Davidian, 2014,pp. 11-54. 15. Ibid., p. 14.16. For a recent and compre-hensive study on the impactof nationalist ideologies onthe practice of art history, seeM. Rampley, 2012. 17. E. Martikyan, 1964.

116


Stalin.18 As one of the leaders of the Van uprising, Terlemezian was a keyfigure in this burgeoning national narrative. He is, forexample, one of the central characters in the secondedition of Gurgen Mahari’s 1967 novel BurningOrchards (Ayrvogh Aygestanner),19 which relates the1915 uprising in Van and its subsequent evacuation.As the fighting intensifies, one officer admonishes anintellectual young man aspiring to serve the rebellionwith his pen: “Panos Terlemezian is a painter, buthe’s put his paintbrush aside and taken up arms andis fighting heroically.”20 With regard to art historywriting, however, it was only after the foundation ofthe Republic of Armenia in 1991 that Terlemezian,like many other Ottoman Armenian and RussianArmenian painters, was retrospectively described asan “Armenian” artist and canonised in modernArmenian art.21 Meri Kirakosyan’s comprehensive2014 monograph establishes Terlemezian as one ofthe most important artists of “Armenian art.”22 In2015, Terlemezian’s 1915 painting Sipan Mountainfrom the Ktuts Island and his 1930 self-portrait brokeout of the sanctity of the National Art Gallery andinto the stores in mass-reproduced copies: the workswere reproduced on a memorial stamp and coins inthe Republic of Armenia on the occasion of the 150th

anniversary of his birth.In Turkey, however, Terlemezian’s life and iden-

tity remain a challenge to both “Turkified” institu-tional art history and the official narrative of the FirstWorld War. As historian Uğur Üngör puts it,“Armenians wish to remember a history that Turkswould like to forget.”23 Thus, the uneasy relationshipbetween Terlemezian and the Armenian Genocide of1915 (and also the Hamidian period) paved the wayto the complete “silence” 24 around his story inTurkish art historiography and to the misinterpreta-tion – indeed, the deliberate distortion – of his political activities in

18. R.G. Suny, 1997, pp. 376,378.19. Mahari’s novel was firstpublished in Yerevan in1967, but later had to berewritten due to censorship,and was only republishedposthumously in 1979, tenyears after the death of theauthor. For a comprehensivediscussion on Mahari’s novel,the harsh criticisms itreceived from nationalists,and the extent to which hehad to rewrite it, see,M. Nichanian, 2002. 20. G. Mahari, 2007, p. 457.21. Nevertheless, he is some-times still regarded as a“Russian” artist in the West,as in the Sotheby’s “RussianSale” in 2006 http://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2006/the-russian-sale- l06110/lot .66.html(accessed 30 Aug. 2015).22. M. Kirakosyan, 2014,p. 167. Emphasis is mine.23. U. Üngör, 2008, p. 26.24. Here I use the word“silence” as defined byMichel-Rolph Trouillot: “anactive and transitive process:one ‘silences’ a fact or an indi-vidual as a silencer silences agun. One engages in the prac-tice of silencing. Mentionsand silences are thus active,dialectical counterparts ofwhich history is the synthe-sis.” M.R. Trouillot, 1995,p. 48.


117

Turkish historiography. In fact, in 2001, the Directorate-General of theState Archives in Turkey published a large collection of documents, each

of which was carefully selected to prove the acceptedthesis, in which Panos Terlemezian, together withother “outlawed” Armenians, was indexed as “anArmenian plotter, engaged with murders in Van”(“Van’da cinayetlere karışan Ermeni fesatçı”).25

Nevertheless, the historian Edhem Eldem very right-ly warns Turkish scholars against the moral implica-tions of doing work only on “good Armenians” whowere active or tacit supporters of the Ottoman state:

Sometimes, the best-intentioned use of this cliché ofthe “good Armenian” actually becomes a concept tac-itly comprising all the ingredients of factionalism […]What to call the Armenians who were not “good”, andwho were not useful to the state and to the nation? […]What about the organized and rebellious ones? Shouldtheir deportation and eradication be excused?26

Thus, as much as this study focuses on Terlemezian as an artist, it isalso an attempt to challenge the hegemonic strategies of nationalist (art)history writing by looking again at a figure who oscillates between twocontroversial roles: the artist as “plotter” versus the artist as “hero.”

THE MAKING OF A REVOLUTIONARY AND AN ARTIST

From Van to Saint Petersburg

Panos Terlemezian was born in Aygestan (The Garden District) on11 March 1865 in the city of Van.27 Aygestan, which residents referredto as the “real Van”, was less congested than the walled city, with mosthouses enjoying a vineyard and garden. The child of a large well-to-dofamily, Terlemezian nevertheless worked sometimes to support his fam-ily financially, assisting in a tailor’s shop.28

The year 1881 was a turning point in Terlemezian’s political educa-tion as he started at the newly-opened school founded by the Istanbul-born Armenian educator and intellectual Mkrtich Portukalian (1848-

25. Y. Sarınay, 2001, p. 93. 26. E. Eldem, 2015, p. 76.27. Van was one of the sixvilayets (provinces) alongsideErzurum, Diyarbekir, Bitlis,Sivas, and Mamüretülaziz. Thegreat majority of OttomanArmenians lived in theseprovinces. On Ottoman localadministrations, see İ. Ortaylı,1974; for the history of Van,see, R.G. Hovanissian, 2000.28. Zaruhi Kalemkiarianwrote in 1920 that Terleme-zian was the son of BoghosAgha (landlord). Accordingto Kalemkiarian, his motherwas also a wealthy woman.Z. Kalemkiarian, 1920.

118


1921). Portukalian was a prolific writer, editor, and political figure whoaimed to mobilise Armenian people around liberal and progressiveideas.29 As such, he travelled extensively in the provinces to set up schoolsand educational organisations, all of which were closed by the Ottomanstate when it exiled him in 1885. Terlemezian wouldlater write that Portukalian’s school “illuminated itsvast neighbouring areas”, and was “a luminous light-house which the sultan’s government turned off.”30

In 1885, inspired by Portukalian’s revolutionaryviews, a group of his Van students, Terlemezianamong them, founded the Armenakan Party.31

Terlemezian’s cousin, Mkrtich Terlemezian, alsoknown as Avetisian, was a key leader of the move-ment.32 The Armenakans believed in the “politicaland cultural education of the masses, propaganda,teaching of military discipline etc.”33 Yet the move-ment was “more of a response to local conditions inline with Portukalian’s thought.”34 It was a “liberaland democratic” formation, and different from suc-ceeding socialist inclined formations – theHnchakian Party, founded in Geneva in 1887 andthe Dashnaktzutiun (Armenian RevolutionaryFederation) founded in Tbilisi in 1890 by RussianArmenian activists – their recruitment and influencewas limited to the Van region.35 One year later, in1886, Terlemezian started teaching geometry, aes-thetics, and technical drawing in a local school; threeyears later, however, the discovery of his political activities against SultanAbdülhamid’s regime led to the loss of his job and forced him to leaveVan; the first in a lifelong series of forced departures and exiles.36

Another key influence on Terlemezian’s political views was the greatnineteenth century novelist Hakob Melik Hakobian (1835-1888),known by his penname Raffi. Born in the city of Salmast in Persia, Raffiwas known as the “precursor or ideologist of the revolution”37 whosenovels and short stories were concerned with the economic, social, andpolitical plight of the Armenian people. In 1890, Terlemezian wascaught red-handed whilst conveying revolutionary literature – most like-

29. G.J. Libaridian definedPortukalian as “a pivotal fig-ure in the transition from amiddle class liberalism […] tothe armed defence of theinterests of the peasantry.”See, G.J. Libaridian, 1987,p. 221; for Armenian revolu-tionary organizations, see,also, A. Ter Minassian, 1984. 30. Quoted in M. Kirakosyan,2014, p. 14.31. R. Panossian, 2006,p. 201. The name of the socie-ty Armenakan came from thenewspaper Armenia, Portuka-lian had established in hisexile at Paris in August 1885.32. L. Nalbandian, 1963, p. 205,en. 42. 33. Ibid.34. R. Panossian, 2006, p. 202.35. A. Ter Minassian, 1994,p. 112.36. M. Kirakosyan, 2014, p. 1537.A.J. Hacikyan, 2005, pp. 346-347.


119

ly including some of Raffi’s works – to Van through Iran and was impris-oned for five weeks.38 After his release, he returned to political involve-ment immediately and, one year later in 1891, was sentenced to death inabsentia for an armed clash in which he and his friends engaged a groupof Kurds and the Ottoman gendarmerie.39 In order to escape the deathpenalty, Terlemezian fled Van via Persia to Tbilisi, then the most signif-icant cultural centre for Russian Armenians.

Effectively in exile for his politics, Terlemezian now turned in earnesttowards his art. Like Istanbul, Tbilisi had undergone considerable polit-ical, cultural, and social transformations starting from the late eigh-teenth century. After the mid-nineteenth century, the city became a

provincial centre for the Russian Empire and hometo many artists and cultural events. The city also tookon a distinctly European flavour. In 1847, one jour-nalist wrote that Tbilisi was “a kind of Janus: one facetowards Asia, and the other towards Europe.”40

Throughout his lifetime, Terlemezian visited Tbilision many occasions. On this, his first visit, he met thefamous Russian Armenian artist Gevorg

Bashinjaghian (1857-1925) and was deeply impressed by his paintings.Unlike the romantic-historicism of the Russian Armenian painter IvanKonstantinovich Aivazovsky (1817-1900), Bashinjaghian was a Realistpainter specializing in scenes of rural life. His landscapes of Armenia’slandmarks, like Mount Ararat and Lake Sevan, palpable in their simplic-ity and veracity, appealed to Terlemezian both aesthetically and for theirnational subjects, inspiring him to become a professional painter. Withthe help of the letter Bashinjaghian wrote to his brother inSt. Petersburg,41 Terlemezian was able to enter the famous paintingschool of the Imperial Society for the Encouragement of the Arts in thecapital of the Russian Empire in 1895. His education was funded by theCatholicos, Mkrtich Khrimian (1820-1907), also a native of Van.

Terlemezian’s education in St. Petersburg involved a full academictraining, and also meant living in the same city as many brilliant Russianpainters, like Ilya Repin (1844-1930) and Ivan Shishkin (1832-1898),who formed the prestigious society of Peredvizhniki (The Wanderers orItinerants). The Peredvizhniki were Realist and self-consciously Russianpainters who believed in conveying social and political critique via art,

38. Teotig, 1912.39. M. Varandian, 1970, pp. 3-2140. Quoted in Revue desétudes géorgiennes et cauca-siennes, 1987. 41. M. Kirakosyan, 2014, p. 16.42. M. Sarkisian, 1960, pp. 42-47.

120


protesting academic restrictions and purveyors of “art for art’s sake.” Thepainters were strongly drawn to the common people and their way oflife; perhaps one reason that later critics would describe Terlemezian as“influenced more by the Eastern than by the Western school of thoughtand style.”42 His art education in Russia, however, came to an abrupt end


121

Figure 2 Panos Terlemezian, Self-Portrait (:%;%$<"=$%/$&), 1897Pencil on paper, 27 x 22 cm; image courtesy of the National Gallery of Armenia

in 1897, when he was taken into custody by the Tsarist police during anart trip to Estonia on the orders of the Ottoman Government.43

The reason for his arrest was the political letters he had been sendingback to Van, under his revolutionary moniker “Minas”,44 most likelyprotesting the terrible plight of the Anatolian Armenians at this time.

Even against the persistent background of social andeconomic problems in the eastern provinces in thelate nineteenth-century, the 1890s were dark timesfor the Armenian population in the margins of theempire. As Selim Deringil explains, due to the cen-tralisation reforms, started in the mid-nineteenth century but felt most acutely in the east-ern provinces by the 1870s, the “Armenians ofAnatolia had suffered two main ills: double taxationand the depredations of the Kurdish tribes. Evenafter they had paid their taxes to the state, theKurdish şeyhs of the area would demand further pay-ment.”45 Then, between 1894 and 1897, whilstTerlemezian was studying in St. Petersburg, therewere organized mass killings of Armenians acrossAnatolia; what became known as the Hamidian mas-sacres. The Sasun massacres in 1894 were a bloodyresponse to an Armenian uprising against unfairtaxes, and similar massacres occurred across OttomanArmenia between 1895 and 1896 including in

Terlemezian’s birthplace, Van. In 1890, perceiving a threat to hisabsolute rule from Armenian nationalist revolutionaries, SultanAbdülhamid II formed the notorious Hamidiye Light CavalryRegiments (Hamidiye Hafif Süvari Alayları), an irregular unit of loyalKurdish tribes,46 giving them license to reduce the majority of OttomanArmenians to “a state of terror.”47

After six months in the Estonian prison at Ottoman behest,Terlemezian underwent an arduous transfer to a prison in Tbilisi, wherehe was kept for another seven months.48 The earliest surviving works byhim, in fact, are the two letter-sized pen drawings he created in 1897,while in prison: My Feet (:= >);0&') and Self-Portrait(:%;%$<"=$%/$&) [see figure 2, p. 121].49

43. M. Kirakosyan, 2014,pp. 17-18.44. Teotig, 1912.45. S. Deringil, 2009, pp. 348-349.46. For a comprehensivestudy on Hamidiye LightCavalry Regiments and therelation between the Kurdishtribes and the Ottoman stateduring the nineteenth andearly twentieth century, seeJ. Klein, 2011. See, also,V. Dadrian, 1995, pp. 113-131. See, also, S. Deringil,2009, pp. 344-371.47. J. Klein, 2011; S. Deringil,2009, p. 351.48. M. Kirakosyan, 2014, pp. 17-18.49. I will further explore thisimage in the fourth part ofmy paper.

122



In the Académie Julian, Paris

After Tbilisi, thanks to his Persian passport (most likely obtainedfrom the Persian Consulate then in Aygestan), Terlemezian was exiledto Persia. Looking to continue his art education, he secretly fled to Paristhrough Georgia, and like many international students, registered at theprivately operated Académie Julian in Paris, where he studied between1899 and 1904.

In Académie Julian, Terlemezian’s tutors were well-respectedpainters of the Parisian art world; the Orientalist painter BenjaminConstant was attracted to exotic subjects, and themaster of the French academic style Jean-PaulLaurens specialized in grandiose historical murals.50

In Paris, Terlemezian also studied the great mastersat the galleries of the Louvre, making copies of oldmasters such as Titian (ca. 1488-1579). Like allAcadémie Julian students, Terlemezian was taught toperfect his anatomical drawing and modelling, and tocreate a highly finished surface, virtually bereft ofimpasto. Indeed, Constant was hostile to any styleoutside the beaux-arts tradition, referring to theImpressionists as “those ‘sal [sic] con’” who “only existto destroy the young.”51 Unlike his academic tutors,however, Terlemezian remained committed to paint-ing the contemporary and everyday world, observingthe charm of nature as well as the realities of lowerclass life. In the Paris art world, “Realism” was anestablished position, associated with the sociallycommitted painting of Gustave Courbet (1819-1877) and the injunction of Honoré Daumier (1808-1879) that “il faut être de son temps” (one must be of one’s times). ForTerlemezian, this resonated with the Realist tendency in both Westernand Eastern Armenian literature, particularly in novels and short storiessince the early 1870s,52 and in Russian Armenian painting likeBashinjaghian’s, which inspired his early work.

Terlemezian’s art education thus took place not only in the dark stu-dios of the Académie Julian, but also during his spare time when he could

50. It is important to notethat many other Ottomanpainters were educated at theAcadémie Julian in the 1910s.As Deniz Artun has pointedout, the privately sponsoredOttoman painters wholacked an official letter fromthe Ottoman Ministry ofEducation needed to registerat the Académie Julian first inorder to enter the École desBeaux-Arts. D. Artun, 2007,pp. 160-161.51. A. Cole, 1976, pp. 112,114. The American artistAlphaeus Cole was a contem-porary of Terlemezian inAcadémie Julian. 52. See, for example, the spe-cial issue of Review ofNational Literatures, 1984.See, also, K.B. Bardakjian,2000.

123

work in plein air and the bright sunshine of France, observing the lives ofordinary people. He travelled around France, sketching the picturesquetowns and people of the western peninsula of Brittany, at that time apoor and isolated region of France. In Brittany, Terlemezian producedhis first major work in 1900 Next to the Well (Près de la Fontaine)53 [see

figure 3, p. 234]. The painting portrays a peasantwoman, in a traditional black costume with whitehead cover, resting beside a well on a sunny day. Thecomposition sets up a lyrical synthesis between therelatively small figure, offset to the right, and the sur-rounding poor brick houses, the texture and details ofwhich are central. The villages and people of Brittanywere a favourite theme for many French artists in thelate-nineteenth century: before Terlemezian, thepainters of the Pont-Aven School (École de Pont-Aven), including Paul Gauguin (1848-1903), hadpainted farmlands and marketplaces peopled withBretons in traditional peasant costumes.54 Yet, differ-ent from the Pont-Aven painters, who worked withpure colours and often sought to convey elements ofsymbolism in their art, Terlemezian’s Brittany isdepicted in naturalistic colour and with stark realism.The picture was first exhibited at the annual Salon

exhibition organized by the Société des artistes français in 1901.55

While living in Paris, Terlemezian was also able to visit RussianArmenia under the protection of Catholicos Khrimian, visitingEtchmiadzin, Sevan, and Ani.56 On finishing his training in 1904, hereturned directly again to Russian Armenia, setting himself to paint itslandscapes and scenes of rural life. The same year, Khrimian commis-sioned a portrait from the artist, which the Catholicos later donated tothe Monastery of Varag in Van57 (the work was most likely destroyedwhen the Monastery was raided in 1915).

Between 1904 and 1908, Terlemezian took trips to Egypt andAlgeria, but mostly travelled in the Caucasus; devoting his time to paint-ing and also exhibiting in Tbilisi. With the death of CatholicosKhrimian in 1907, Terlemezian lost both a friend and a patron.Terlemezian initially returned to Paris and began to experiment with

53. The Armenian title ofthe picture is [Woman]Worker Next to the Well(?@A$)$2*&*+B"% ?--C7*+&" D*)).54. For a comprehensivestudy on Gauguin’s iconogra-phy and symbolism, seeH. Dorra, 2007. For an arthistorical survey on the rep-resentation of Breton peas-ants, see D. Delouche, 1977.55. It is listed in the exhibitioncatalogue as Près de la Fontaine.“Terlémezian (Panos), né àVan (Turquie), élève deM. Jean-Paul Laurens, Rue desChartreux, 6.” Société desartistes français, 1901, p. 195.56. M. Kirakosyan, 2014, p. 22.57. Ibid., p. 23.

124


new ways of depicting his surroundings, rather than striving for photo-graphic realism. He started to capture his own perception of light andshadows, and paint Parisian city life in impressionistic brushstrokes. Hepainted the Fontaine de l’Observatoire and particularly of the horsesdesigned by the French sculptor Emmanuel Frémiet (1824-1910). In1910, he participated, again, in the annual Salon exhibition organized bythe Société des Artistes Français, not with an impressionist landscape,but with a decorative panel “projet” La Charité rendered in “vieux stylearménien.”58 Yet Terlemezian does not seem to have found a buyer forthis work in Paris; the artwork, which would later hang on the walls ofTerlemezian’s Istanbul atelier, depicted the medieval king of Armenia“Ashot III (?@*) >-*&=$E)” and was, for Teotig, a brilliant example“to rejuvenate the Armenian style.”59 When Terlemezian left Paris forIstanbul in 1910, he was a forty five year old man and something of atechnical virtuoso, capable of painting with neutral observation andtechnical proficiency, and, while adept at the conventional smooth fin-ish he learned from his Russian and French academic tutors, was also amaster of creating occasional spontaneous studies, capturing the coloursand lights of his surroundings with thick impastos influenced byImpressionists.

Yet how would Terlemezian’s previous political stance against theAbdülhamid regime shape (or preclude) his artisticcareer among the Istanbul cultural elite? Answering– or even asking – this question involves clarifyingwhat is meant by “revolutionary” and “anti-establish-ment” movements before and during the SecondConstitutional Period, which turns out to involvecomplex, often conflicting, issues in the Ottomanpast. Turkish historians’ attitudes to rebellions whichoccurred in the empire have been ambivalent: whilstthe anti-Hamidian Young Turk leaders (and amongthem only the Muslim Turks) have been celebratedby emphasizing the role they played in theConstitutional Revolution, the anti-Hamidianmovements led by Ottoman Arabs or OttomanArmenians have been despised and stigmatized as treacherous. In this par-ticular kind of narrative, a figure like Terlemezian has inevitably suffered

58. “Terlémezian (Panos), néà Van (Turquie d’Asie), élèvede Benjamin-Constant et deM. Jean-Paul Laurens, Boule-vard Saint-Jacques, 51. No. 5599« La Charité » projet de déco-ration ; vieux style arménien.”Société des artistes français,1910, p. 514.59. Teotig, 1912. Today, thiswork belongs to the collec-tion of the National Galleryof Armenia (F0/*&$)"21$%* B$7/$/$% *G*2 2$-&$H*+7&" B$=$&, 1909).


125

from prejudices and distortions in Turkish historiography. It is the veryteleology of this position – searching for “revolution-aries” whom later (art) historians have accepted orrejected – which makes this reductionist hypothesisabout late Ottoman history misleading. Quite thecontrary, when we attempt to understand this periodon its own terms, with all its non-linearity and con-tradictions, we achieve a more sophisticatedapproach to a moment of which a political figure andan artist like Terlemezian was an integral part. In thefollowing section, I aim to focus on Terlemezian’scontribution to the Istanbul art world and his jour-ney to official favour after 1910, before he once againfound himself an exile in 1915.

FROM OFFICIAL FAVOUR TO EXILE (AGAIN)

“In the Capital of the Sultans”

Terlemezian arrived in the Ottoman capital in1910; two years after the Constitutional Revolution,and one year after the dethronement of SultanAbdülhamid II and his replacement by SultanMehmed V Reşad (r. 1909-1918). Through the revo-lution, led by the Western-educated “Young Turks”and their Committee of Union and Progress(CUP),60 the Ottoman people had regained their

parliament and constitution, suspended some thirty years earlier byAbdülhamid II.61 The revolution ended Abdülhamid’s absolutist regime,with its atmosphere of paranoia, surveillance, and censorship. With thenewfound freedoms of assembly and expression came an infectiousatmosphere of enthusiasm in the entire city. As the revolution had pro-claimed “Liberty, Equality, Freedom, and Justice”, Istanbul now wel-comed back many political exiles like Terlemezian. The Armenian femi-nist writer and activist, Yevpime Avetisian (1871-1950), also known asAnaïs, wrote in her memoirs of this new atmosphere of freedom forArmenian intellectuals and revolutionaries:

60. The “Turk” in the “YoungTurks” implies, prima facie, anethnic definition. HasanKayalı has convincinglyregarded the designation of“Young Turk” as an “unfortu-nate misnomer,” for it con-jures away the fact that theseYoung Turks included manyArabs, Albanians, Jews intheir ranks, especially in theearly stages of the movement.H. Kayalı, 1997, p. 4.61. Of the deputies elected tothe Parliament in 1908, 142were Turks, sixty Arabs,twenty-five Albanians, twen-ty-three Greeks, twelveArmenians (including twoUnionists, four Dashnaks,one Hnchak, one “Liberal”and two “Independents”),five Jews, four Bulgarians,three Serbs, and one Vlach.Though Feroz Ahmad liststwelve Armenian deputies,Anahide Ter Minassian re-cords the total number as ten.See F. Ahmad, 1982, pp. 401-434; A. Ter Minassian, 1994,pp. 139-140.

126


All the intellectuals and revolutionaries who had been sent into exilewere gradually returning. They received special treatment and recogni-tion from Armenians, as if their names were surmounted with halos, fol-lowed by crowns of thorns. They gave lectures and speeches inArmenian, and the public lapped up their words. There were many lik-able figures among these revolutionaries in addition to the ones we hadknown previously. It was a real treat to associate with them, listen to thedetails of what they had done, get excited by their expectations, and bereinvigorated by their mission. Those who were leading intellectualsgreeted the Armenian intellectuals of Istanbul like real brothers, appre-ciating everyone according to his true merit.62

For the Istanbul-born Levantine art critic, Adolphe Thalasso, theeruption of the Constitutional Revolution was a ground breaking artis-tic progress in the empire: With “the constitutional regime in Turkey”wrote Thalasso in his L’Art ottoman: les peintres de Turquie “all the artsin this country are about to undergo a development unknown untiltoday.”63 Thalasso was right to be optimistic; in 1909, the “OttomanSociety of Painters” was formed to publicize “love of the fine arts” and“progress the art of painting in the Ottoman State.”64 The Society,founded mostly by the graduates and students of the Academy of FineArts (Sanayi-i Nefise Mektebi) in Istanbul, published the first art journalbetween 1911 and 1914 and contributed to developing the art market byopening regular exhibitions in its centre. Unlike many other Ottomanartists of the era, Terlemezian did not receive his art training at theAcademy of Fine Arts, and his political commitments had preventedhim from being a painter under the regime of Sultan Abdülhamid II.Though we don’t know whether he joined theSociety or not (the inaugural membership registra-tion notebook has apparently not survived untiltoday), Terlemezian became part of the vividIstanbul cultural milieu with many other profession-al painters, and, like most of them, had to rely on giv-ing private painting classes and the increasingly dif-ferentiated patronage of the art market to supporthimself.

Terlemezian rented an apartment at the PangaltıStreet of the Şişli district within walking distance ofthe lively European cultural centre, Pera. He shared the apartment with

62. Y. Avetisian, 1949. Thissection together with otherfew pages from My Recollec-tions were translated andpublished in A.J. Hacikyan,2005.63. A. Thalasso, 1911.64. N. Terzi, 1979, p. 14. Forthe Ottoman Society ofPainters, see for example,A.S. Güler, 1994; G. Tongo,2012.


127

his old friend, the Ottoman Armenian priest, composer and musicolo-gist, Soghomon Soghomonian, known as Gomidas.65 They immediatelyturned the spacious apartment into a studio for private students of paint-ing and music. Terlemezian would later write that:

We met once again in the capital of the sultans, ate together at the sametable, and lived together with memories of centuries-old cultural tradi-tions in our hearts. Our house became a cultural centre for intellectualsand artists from different nationalities. There were Greek thinkers com-ing for Gomidas to talk about the birth of Church music, and Turks tochat about starting a conservatory and an opera.66

The house Terlemezian remembered was a microcosm of the multi-cultural “city of the sultans” in which differentnations and religions intermingled and, in this case atleast, cooperated. Terlemezian also seems to have hadgood networks of private patronage in the city. As hewrote in his memoirs, important Ottoman bureau-crats like İsmail Cenani Bey, Chief of the Bureau ofProtocol of the Imperial Council (Teşrifat-ıUmumiye Nazırı), visited their house to see his paint-ings.67 Another successful way of attracting clientelein the city was certainly offering painting and draw-ing lessons to affluent members of the Ottoman mid-dle class. Indeed, Terlemezian’s students includedwell-to-do Ottoman Armenian women likeShoushan Boshnakian and Adrine Donelian.68

Terlemezian was also active in the Istanbul artmarket. In 1911, he participated in an exhibitionorganized at the famous club of La Società Operaia (aclub which had been founded in 1863 as an associa-tion for workers in Pera). The exhibition also hostedworks by Istanbul-based painters like MüfideHanım (1890-1912),69 a Muslim woman painter,and Leonardo de Mango (1843-1930),70 the popularItalian orientalist artist. Terlemezian’s technique wassomething of a novelty for the Ottoman audience.

Though he was faithful to the old tradition of depicting a beautiful

65. R. Soulahian Kuyumjian,2001, p. 72.66. Quoted in M. Bilal andB. Yıldız, 2015. 67. İsmail Cenani Bey wasquite an important figure inIstanbul. He was the secondpresident of the IstanbulSociety for the Protection ofAnimals (Himaye-i Hayva-nat Cemiyeti) and also anactive supporter of TurkishRed Crescent. See, A.Z. İzgöerand R. Tuğ, 2013, p. 228.68. For a photo of these stu-dents in Terlemezian’s stu-dio, see M. Saris, 2005, p. 151. 69. Halil Edhem, who servedas director of the Academy ofFine Arts and of the ImperialMuseum, refers to the sameexhibition as the “fifth exhi-bition” organised at “SoçiyetaOperaya” (Società Operaia).See H. Edhem, 2014, p. 81,fn. 36.70. Ö.F. Şerifoğlu and İ. Baytar,2005, p. 90.

128


object (mostly landscape), his free and spontaneous painting techniqueand particularly the impasto application of colour was different frommost contemporary Ottoman painters (though similar techniqueswould later be popularized by the Turkish Impressionists). In 1912, ashort biography and photograph of the increasinglyfamous Terlemezian were published in Teotig’sEveryone’s Almanac. After briefly mentioning his life,revolutionary activities, and exile, the article refers toTerlemezian’s “fearless” return to Istanbul and givesan overview of his participation in the Pera exhibi-tion. Teotig wrote that Terlemezian’s landscapes,portraits, and interior scenes were “realist, but also had their own novelsense of line, and a sincerity [3I%3I46I] noticeable above all else.”71

During his time in Istanbul, Terlemezian produced a series of paint-ings of the Bosphorus, palaces, kiosks, and castles. Terlemezian scouredIstanbul in search of perfect places to paint. The best views of the citywere available from the hills of the Beşiktaş district, whose shores glit-tered with luxurious yalıs (waterfront mansions) and imperial palaces. Inher memoirs, Anaïs describes Terlemezian visiting her house to paint herview after snowfall:

The likeable painter came to ask for permission to paint the remarkableview […]. When painting, he was serious, sullen and quiet, but I wouldtalk to him occasionally, and he would nod his head. That dignifiedartist had an austere personality. When he was not painting, he was notvery talkative, but what he said was interesting, though sometimes raw.72

The elevated viewpoint must have been tempting for Terlemezian, ashis various paintings of the shoreline reveal. Among these, his 1911 workDolmabahçe Palace in Constantinople (F*5=$-J$A8$ K$5$)'(*3)$%<%*+1*53*+=) depicts the palace of Sultan Abdülmecid I [seefigure 4, p. 235]. In 1894, the French writer Pierre Loti describedDolmabahçe as: “a line of palaces as white as snow, rising from marblequays at the very edge of the sea.”73 Upon its completion in 1856, thePalace became one of the major landmarks of Istanbul situated outsidethe old-walled city, and was a popular subject for both painters and pho-tographers. In an earlier and smaller study of the same scene, painted indarker tones and thicker brushstrokes, Terlemezian does not include the

71. Teotig, 1912. 72. Y. Avetisian, 1949, p. 193.I would like to thank VazkenDavidian for introducing meto Anaïs and showing me thissection from her memoirs.73. P. Loti, 1894, p. 132.


129

entire building of the Main Palace. In Dolmabahçe Palace inConstantinople, however, Terlemezian obtained the best point of view ofthe palace buildings, a view also chosen by other artists, including theIstanbul-based photography studio Sébah and Joaillier. Painted from thetop of the hill and from the west, one can see the entire façade of theCeremonial Hall and the Administrative section (Mabeyn-i Hümayun)

rising up behind the Treasury Gate, white against thegreen and sienna hills of the Asian side and the blueBosphorus, on which pass a pleasure boat and animperial frigate, decked out in celebration.

The beauty and also popularity of the Bosphorusappear to have influenced Terlemezian’s choice ofsubjects as he painted many local city views. Indeed,there was an interest in landscape painting in theexpanding art market; unlike historical paintings ormythological subjects, landscapes were understand-able and affordable. Moreover, traditional norms oftaste for non-figurative painting were most likelyprevalent among sections of the Empire’s ruling eliteswho were particularly interested in Bosphorus viewsin Istanbul Salon exhibitions.74 Terlemezian’s entre-preneurial savvy in depicting the city’s attractions

and pleasant scenery must have brought him some modest prosperity.Yet, Terlemezian was also highly interested in Armenian architecture.In addition to creating many works specially featuring buildingsdesigned by Ottoman Armenian architects (such as Dolmabahçe Palaceand Küçüksu Palace, both designed by the members of the Balian fami-ly),75 he also wrote about them. His article on Hovsep Aznavour (1853-1935) and Leon Nafilian (1877-1937), focusing on their talent indesigning, was published in Shant, a contemporary Western Armenianjournal.76 Describing the “fabulous structure” of another Armenianbuilding, Terlemezian would later write that “we, indeed, can be asproud of this architecture as the Greeks are of their classical art.”77

In the summer of 1912, Terlemezian travelled with Gomidas to thelatter’s homeland, Kütahya, on a journey of discovery, artistic creation,and seclusion – a semi-sacred journey in the Romantic tradition ofnature worship popularized by Rousseau and Goethe, whose translated

74. Adolphe Thalasso writesabout an Ottoman Paşa whonegotiates for the price of aBosphorus view in an Istanbulart exhibition. A. Thalasso,1907-1908, pp. 503-504.75. On the history of theBalian family of architectsand their remarkable contri-bution to the silhouette ofIstanbul, see, for instance, A.Wharton, 2015.76. M. Kirakosyan, 2014, p. 125.77. The building Terlemezianrefers to here is the Holy CrossChurch on Aghtamar Island.Quoted in M. Kirakosyan,2014, p. 30.

130


works were popular among contemporary Armenian intellectuals.78 AsTerlemezian described it:

After travelling in Kütahya and the region for a while, we went to a min-eral spring, founded by the Romans for its healing properties, which wasfar from the city. Armenians and Turks were staying there in tents, yetwe set up our tent in the forest on the top of the hill and went into seclu-sion for around one and a half months.79

These days in Kütahya were productive ones for Terlemezian:

I painted Gomidas there. And a small painting of two goats; this work isnow with an American collector. I also did a painting of a farmer. Whenwe came back to Kütahya from the spring, Gomidas went immediatelyto Istanbul, but I stayed on a little longer to paint the beautiful scenery.There, I also painted a work depicting a carpet-waving woman, whichwas sold at my exhibition in Istanbul.80

One year later, in 1913, Terlemezian went on another journey inAnatolia to the city of Bursa; the aim was to paint the old capital of theOttoman Empire. The 1913 painting of The Tomb of Sultan Çelebi,Bursa (!*+56$% L05$C"" F$=C$&$%' J&*+3$7*+=) [see figure 5,p. 236] is proof of his technical proficiency and metic-ulous attention to architectural detail: the muqarnasniche of the mihrab, the blue-green tiles forming thedado, and the golden calligraphy around the tomb inthe Green Tomb (Yeşil Türbe) are all rendered inrefined brushwork and careful blending of shadowsand lights, reminiscent of Orientalist masters like histutor Constant and Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824-1904).The city of Bursa and particularly the Green Tombwere popular destinations for painters and also adesirable subject for the Ottoman as well as the inter-national art market. The prominent Ottomanpainter, intellectual, and public figure Osman HamdiBey, for instance, had created a number of paintings of the Tomb in the1880s, in which the Austrian Art Museum expressed an interest.81 Exactlyhow many paintings Terlemezian created in the Green Tomb is unclear,but when one of them went on show in Istanbul in 1920, it was praised

78. For the influence ofEuropean Romantics onArmenian writers, see, forexample, V. Oshagan, 1984,pp. 28-44.79. Quoted in M. Bilal andB. Yıldız, 2015.80. Ibid.81. M. Roberts, 2015, pp. 122-125. For the most recent andcomprehensive study onOsman Hamdi, see E. Eldem,2010.


131

for its “remarkable light harmony”.82 The Green Tomb was a popularsubject in exhibitions, and a version in which Terlemezian depicted “ahoja reads the Kor’an”83 appears to have been sold.

The year 1913 marked an increasing recognition of Terlemezian’s talentby the Ottoman cultural establishment. Chosen as one of only five artists torepresent the empire, he sent three works to the International Munich exhi-bition. Terlemezian’s paintings were exhibited along with those of otherIstanbul-based artists like Joseph Warnia, the Polish instructor of theAcademy of Fine Arts, Jean Vakalapoulos, most likely an OttomanGreek artist, and two Muslim-Ottoman painters, Ali Fuad Bey andŞevket Bey.84 Terlemezian sent three works to the exhibition: an interi-or painting of an Armenian church, a portrait of Gomidas titled AnArmenian Priest, and a landscape of the Bosphorus around ruinedRumeli Hisari fortress [see figure 6, above].85 Terlemezian received amedal for his paintings,86 an academic honour he relates in characteristi-cally taciturn style.

132


Figure 6 Panos Terlemezian, The Bosphorus, 1913(?)Navasart, 1914; exhibited at the International Munich Exhibition in 1913Current location unknown, image courtesy of AGBU Nubar Library, Paris

In the exhibition of 1913, the German jury awarded my paintings withgolden medal. The Bosphorus landscape was sold immediately; the por-trait was lost in Odessa; I donated the interior painting to the NationalGallery of Armenia.87

One year later, the Istanbul Armenian journalNavasart published a short article about the exhibi-tion together with a reproduction of his paintings.The article announces that Terlemezian’s “ChurchInterior” was awarded with a “golden” medal.”88

Terlemezian was now clearly an officially-favoured and respectable artist who could be chosento represent the Ottoman Empire in modern inter-national art exhibitions. Then, in July 1914, probablydue to his participation in the Munich exhibitionand also on the recommendation of Gomidas,Terlemezian was introduced to Prince AbdülmecidEfendi, one of the sons of Sultan Abdülaziz (r. 1861-1876), and a talented painter of historical scenes, agreat patron of art, and the honorary president of theOttoman Society of Painters:

Gomidas had been giving Prince Abdülmecid’s wifemusic classes […] he told me that the Prince would liketo receive me in his palace and show me his paintings.He had been taking painting classes for fifteen years[…]. He welcomed us with great kindness, after coffeehe brought out one of his paintings to ask my opinion.

Abdülmecid showed Terlemezian a large histori-cal painting depicting an Ottoman sultan sitting witha young prince in a room decorated with valuableEastern textiles. No flatterer, Terlemezian began toharshly criticize the picture:

The figure was one of their old sultans with a valuableLahore scarf on his shoulder, sitting on a cushion andleaning his back on a pillow. Both the cushion and thepillow were positioned on a dirty wooden floor. As

82. Djagadamard, 15 April1920. I would like to thankAri Şekeryan once again forsharing his Turkish transla-tions of Djagadamard andalso of Verchin Lur, whichare the object of his own PhDresearch.83. Djagadamard, 15 April1920.84. Illustrierter Katalog, 1913.85. In the German catalogue,the names of his paintingswere: “Inneres einer armenis-chen Kirche in Lori”, “Einarmenischer Landpriester” and“Der Bosporus bei Rouméli-Hissar,” Illustrierter Katalog,1913, p. 183.86. Medaillen II. Klasse. Ibid,p. xxii.87. Quoted in M. Bilal and B.Yıldız, 2015. In 1924 whilstin New York Terlemezianwrote in his will that hewould donate his works tothe National Gallery ofArmenia. M. Kirakosyan,2014, pp. 36-37.88. Navasart, 1914, p. 271.Terlemezian would laterwrite of the exhibition thatthere were only “threepainters […] One Turk, aPolish instructor from the artschool, and me.” Quoted inM. Bilal and B. Yıldız, 2015.The German catalogue, how-ever, names five artists from“Konstantinopel”.


133

though the Sultan in the painting would have had no carpet in his house[…] Whilst I was slowly explaining my opinions, I came to the issue ofthe curtain. I told him that the main motif seemed to be the curtain andall the other objects gave the impression of being there to fill up thepainting.89

Neither Abdülmecid Efendi nor Gomidas were happy withTerlemezian’s “unfiltered” criticism. As Terlemezian also added in hismemoirs, according to the rumour, Prince Abdülmecid Efendi was sofurious after their meeting that he left the Palace immediately and stayed

in his other residence in Üsküdar for 8 days.90 Yet themeeting itself is significant as it reveals something ofTerlemezian’s character; his “raw” and frank attitude,a little anti-authoritarian recklessness, but also hisfaithfulness to empirical accuracy and emotionaltruth in art. It also illustrates the influenceTerlemezian, a provincial Ottoman Armenian bybirth, had on an aristocrat like Abdülmecid Efendi,simply by dint of his technical expertise. Indeed, itseems the Prince never completed the painting

Terlemezian criticized (now held in a private collection).91

Terlemezian’s meeting with a prince and his participation in theOttoman section of Munich exhibition are also interesting snapshots ofthe changing social dynamics of the art world Terlemezian was now partof. Both events demonstrate the liberal atmosphere of theConstitutional era, in which a previous exile like Terlemezian could rep-resent the empire in an international exhibition and in which these two“political” figures, who had suffered under the old regime in differentways, could meet to discuss (and disagree about) art (Prince Abdülmecidonce told Pierre Loti that he had spent Sultan Abdülhamid’s twenty-eight year reign “in a tomb”).92 Yet, on the other hand, both events alsotook place just after the Balkan Wars (1912-13), when the empire lost83 per cent of its European territory,93 which altered the balance of itsmulti-ethnic and multi-religious population. The Committee of Unionand Progress (CUP) immediately seized power in January 1913 with amilitary coup d’État headed by Lieutenant-Colonel Enver Bey, markingthe beginning of the five-year dictatorial triumvirate of Enver, Talat, and

89. Quoted in M. Bilal andB. Yıldız, 2015.90. Ibid.91. For a reproduction ofAbdülmecid Efendi’s paint-ing, see the book, Hanedan-dan Bir Ressam, 2004, p. 77.92. P. Mansel, 1995, p. 362.93. Z. Toprak, 2002, pp. 45-46.

134


Cemal Paşas until the end of the First World War. After the loss of theBalkans, the CUP also moved rapidly to institute a ruthlessly anti non-Muslim Turkification policy, adopting Turkish ethno-nationalism as itsofficial ideology at its 1913 Congress. The new political situation wasbroached in contemporary art discussions, which begun to revolvearound the question of “national art”. Yet, to dismiss these debates asxenophobic propaganda against non-Turkish artists would be a mistake.The front cover of the seventeenth issue of the Journal of the OttomanSociety of Painters, for instance, featured an Ottoman Armenian painter:the chief painter of the Hereke Factory (Hereke Fabrika-i Hümayunu),Tovmas Efendi. The article inside described TovmasEfendi as an artist working “with national and har-monious colours and lines.”94 Indeed, for most non-Turkish artists, the feeling of belonging to the“Ottoman” cultural identity, or, in contemporaryterminology, Ottoman “national” identity, was neither a matter of race,nor of religion, nor of language. On the contrary, the “national” charac-ter of an artist was more a matter of an ability or willingness to represent“national” character in his or her art. Terlemezian would reiterate a sim-ilar message at a speech he gave in Paris in 1921, combining an appeal touniversal humanity with attention to its authentic local and nationalmanifestations: “art is for man, therefore the artist must bring his ownenvironment to life, otherwise he becomes one who lives on the crumbsfrom foreign tables.”95 This is not, however, to deny Terlemezian’sinvolvement in Armenian revolutionary movement nor his strong iden-tification with Armenian culture, but only to resist the idea of reducinghim to an Armenian painter whose identity was defined negativelyagainst the Ottoman one. That is to say, Terlemezian’s emphasis onbringing the artist’s “own environment to life” was as much about “hisown” Armenian culture as it was about “his own” Ottoman environ-ment and identity.

Yet a short time after the Munich exhibition and Terlemezian’smeeting with Abdülmecid Efendi, the historical course of both his lifeand of the Ottoman Empire were to change dramatically.

94. “Tovmas Efendi,” OsmanlıRessamlar Cemiyeti Gazetesi,1914.95. Quoted in M. Kirakosyan,2014, p. 32.


135

1915 and After: Van, Tbilisi, and Occupied Istanbul

When the First World War started in late July 1914, Terlemezianwas in Van after a long absence from his birthplace: As he wrote in hismemoirs, “after becoming a painter, I wanted very much to see mybeloved Vaspurakan [Van] and to create new works of art about its unri-valled beauty.”96 During the three months when the Ottoman Empirewas still ostensibly neutral, before it entered the war on 29 October1914, Terlemezian stayed on Aghtamar Island:

Before Turkey joined the war, I rushed to enter the Island of Aghtamarin order to paint. I have to say that I was filled with pleasure and ferventhope about the tremendous beauty of these places, and that I would beable to win something for Armenian art.97

We don’t know exactly whether Terlemezian was producing hissketches of manuscripts at the Holy Cross Church on Aghtamar orworking on his painting Sipan Mountain in Ktuts Island when things

began to change for the Armenian population ofVan. In March 1915, Cevdet Paşa, then the governorof Van and a fervent Unionist and the brother-in-lawof Enver Paşa (The War Minister), ordered the gen-darmes to search Armenian villages for hidden armsand arrest anyone suspected of carrying weaponsagainst the Ottoman army. Upon the murder of thetwo Armenian leaders, Arshak Vramian (a memberof the Ottoman parliament) and NikoghayosMikaelian (also known as Ishkhan), the Armeniansof Van begun to prepare under Aram Manukian to“resist immanent massacre.”98 The initial armed

uprising lasted for a period of less than a month from 19 April to 17 May1915.99 A week after the uprising began, Terlemezian’s friend Gomidaswas arrested along with other Armenian political and intellectual leaderspurged from Istanbul on 24 April 1915;100 an event which initiated theOttoman government’s campaign against the Anatolian Armenians.

In Van itself, Terlemezian rose to become one of the best known mil-itary leaders of the uprising. As reported by Y.K. Rushdouni, the most

96. Quoted in M. Kirakosyan,2014, p. 29. Armenians refer-red to the province of Van asVaspurakan.97. Quoted in ibid., p. 30.98. E. Rogan, 2015, p. 169. 99. There are a number ofstudies on the uprising inVan. See, for example,R. Hovannisian, 1967, par-ticularly the section “Delive-rance and Evacuation ofVan”, pp. 55-57.

136


able leaders of the resistance were “Armenag Yegarian, with his cool andable leadership; Aram, with his constant presence and advice;P. Terlemezian, with his great heart; Krikor of Bulgaria with his inde-fatigable industry and inventive genius.”101 Terlemezian would also laterwrite of the uprising:

In the most violent days of clashes, villagers were dig-ging trenches and labouring day and night. I could seethat some villagers were fighting at the frontlines, tinychildren aged four and five were crawling on theground and removing the enemy shells and bringingthem to us.102

Terlemezian most likely left Van just after 31 July1915 alongside the approximately 100,000 otherArmenians who withdrew with the Russian forces inwhat came to be known as the Great Retreat.103

Terlemezian would lose many of his art works in thefire and turmoil, and this was the last time he wouldsee his “beloved Vaspurakan”.

In 1916, Terlemezian was in Tbilisi to form the“Society of Armenian Painters,” with RussianArmenian painters including Martiros Sarian,Yeghishe Tadevosyan, and Vardges Sureniants. Untilthe end of the First World War, he mostly travelledin the Caucasus, including Batum, Bjni, and Yerevan.He created many paintings featuring Lake Sevan,buildings in Yerevan, Mountain Ararat, as well asportraits and still lifes.

Terlemezian came back to Istanbul twice duringthe Armistice Period; the first time between 1919-1920 and the second in 1922.104 While the cityTerlemezian returned to in 1919 was politically verydifferent from the one he had lived in with Gomidasuntil 1914, the occupation did not restrict culturalactivities in Pera or the art market, and there wereregular exhibitions organised at Lycée de Galata-Sérai(first organised in 1916).105 Like Terlemezian, a few Ottoman Armenian


137

100. Gomidas was rescuedthrough the intervention ofinfluential friends, but he suf-fered a psychological traumawidely believed to have robbedhim of his mental health.Historians still do not knowwho really influenced or forcedTalat Paşa, then the Ministerof Interior, to sign a coded tele-graph on 7 May 1915 in whichsome Armenians, includingGomidas, were notified thatthey were allowed to return toIstanbul. According torumour, it was either the Ame-rican Ambassador in Constan-tinople, Henry Morgenthau,or Prince Abdülmecid Efendi.Gomidas was the musicinstructor to AbdülmecidEfendi’s wife, also, his personalphysician was Dr. VahramTorkomian, another Arme-nian who was arrested withGomidas on 24 April 1915and was allowed to return toIstanbul. See, R. SoulahianKuyumjian, 2001, pp. 130-131.101. “Van: Narrative by Mr.Y.K. Rushdouni,” 1916, p. 65.102. Quoted in M. Kirakosyan,2014, pp. 126-127.103. E. Rogan, 2015, p. 171.104. M. Kirakosyan, 2014, p. 32.105. For Galatasary exhibi-tions, see Ö.F. Şerifoğlu, 2003.

writers and intellectuals also returned to the city aiming to renew“Armenian literary and intellectual life.”106 During his stay, Terlemeziancreated a varied body of paintings depicting his favourite scenes of thecity, including the Bosphorus and the Rumeli Hisari Castle. In 1920,Terlemezian and another Ottoman Armenian painter, Levon SerovpeKurkciyan (1872-1924),107 held an art exhibition at the ArmenianAssociation in Pera. According to a contemporary Istanbul-basedArmenian newspaper, the exhibition was well-visited by many importantfigures, including the famous painters Halil Paşa, Namık Bey, ŞevketBey, Feyhaman Bey, İbrahim Çallı, and Sami Bey.108 Terlemezian him-

self exhibited around ninety works in the exhibition,including his landscapes of Lake Sevan and MountArarat, the 1913 painting of The Tomb of SultanÇelebi, and his 1913 painting of the now traumatizedGomidas in Kütahya.109 Of this last, HovhannesAsbed reported that it was “less impressive thanupsetting, leaving us to reflect on the fate of this greatmaster.”110 After the 1920 exhibition, Terlemezianleft Istanbul for Italy and Paris in 1921. In 1922, hereturned to Istanbul for a short and final visit. As theallies’ occupation of Istanbul began to look increas-ingly untenable in the face of the Turkish nationalistforces’ defeat of the Greek army, he began to lookabroad once more.

The changing historical factors in Terlemezian’slife – from a political exile to an established painterthen to an internal enemy during the First WorldWar and a survivor of the genocide during theArmistice Period – immediately raise the question ofthe politics of his vision.111 In the following section, Iturn to the questions of the extent to whichTerlemezian’s choice of subjects related to his poli-tics, whether his political position can be recovered

from his art, and whether the experiences of war and genocide affectedhis art.

106. Jennifer Manoukian,“Armenian Intellectual Lifein Constantinople duringthe Armistice Period.”http://www.docblog.ottomanhistorypodcast.com/2014/04/armenian-intellectual-life-in.html (accessed 30 Sept.2015).107. For further informationon Kurkciyan, see M. Saris,2005, pp. 77-78. 108. Djagadamard, 6 May1920.109. Verchin Lur, 28 April1920.110. Ibid.111. I am referring here toLinda Nochlin’s 1989 bookThe Politics of Vision whichdeals “with the issue of artand politics,” and whichresponds to the “problematicrelation to the political” inrevisionism as “thinking arthistory Otherly.” L. Nochlin,1989, pp. xii, xv.

138


THE POLITICS OF TERLEMEZIAN’S VISION

Terlemezian produced only two important works directly related tohis resistance to the Hamidian regime: Self-Portrait and My Feet, creat-ed in 1897 during his imprisonment. Perhaps alone in a solitary cell, theaim of the artist was probably to practise painting the human figure forlack of another model. Terlemezian would later write in his memoirsthat he had requested paints from the authorities in prison yet he couldonly receive pens, paper, and ink.112 Whatever the practical intentions orthe conditions of production, it seems clear that the particular choice ofbody parts and the (lack of) setting has broader significance for the artist.His feet and face are real but also simultaneously allegorical. My Feetshows these agents of travel and freedom propped uselessly on a bed-head, while Self-Portrait [see figure 2, p. 121] gazes dispassionately at theaging artist’s dark thinning hair, bushy facial hair, and darkly purposefulface. Despite the fact that Terlemezian played an active political roleagainst the Hamidian regime, he chose to depict amoment of defeat, yet without acknowledging theinterior setting of his prison cell: a form of resistancewithout any sign of fighting. Of the many self-por-traits Terlemezian would later produce, his 1897 self-portrait is also unique in several ways: this is the firstsurviving artwork we have by the artist and the onlyprison self-portrait, to my knowledge, by an artist from the OttomanEmpire. Yet what we intimate from these pictures can be used to make amore general claim about the works that Terlemezian produced duringhis period of political activity, and even after the dethronement of SultanAbdülhamid II in 1909; that, despite their clearly passionate commit-ment to Realist methods, they can hardly be considered as directly engag-ing with political subjects, at least in an explicitly “propagandistic” sense.

If one compares his paintings to those by contemporary Armenianartists, the lack of a propagandistic message in Terlemezian’s worksbecomes more apparent.113 The Hamidian massacres were a turningpoint for Aivazovksy’s relation to Abdülhamid. Like Sultan Abdülmecid(r. 1839-1861) and Sultan Abdülaziz (r. 1861-1876), Abdülhamid hadpreviously commissioned a number of the artist’s distinctive marinelandscapes. After 1895, however, as a reaction to the Hamidian mas-

112. M. Kirakosyan, 2014, p. 18.113. For the representation ofthe Hamidian massacres andthe genocide in Armenian art,see, S. Khachatryan, 2010 andA. Aghasyan, 2015, pp. 70-80.


139

sacres, Aivazovsky produced a series of paintings and sketches depictingthe horror of the events, such as The Massacre of Armenians in Trebizondin 1895 [see figure 7, p. 141]. Aivazovsky’s work was later reproduced in

a propagandistic Russian publication with the titleFraternal Help for the Suffering of the Armenians inTurkey.114 Here Aivazovsky depicts a beach scene inwhich Ottoman troops arrive by boat, butcheringArmenian men on the shore and carrying off anArmenian woman. Like Aivazovsky, ArshagFetvadjian (1866-1947) conveys a strong politicalmessage in his 1903 watercolour The Woman ofSasun.115 It portrays a sturdy woman, with a fierceexpression, perched on the top of a rocky hill watch-ing out enemies with one hand on her rifle and theother supporting the baby she is nursing. The heroicdepiction of the woman’s motherhood and determi-nation arguably symbolize Armenia’s ability to bothconfront Kurdish attackers and endure into the nextgeneration.

In this context, the lack of overt propagandisticsentiments in Terlemezian’s art is remarkable. Thedehumanization of the “enemy” and Romantic ideal-isation of Armenians we see in Aivazovsky andFetvadjian respectively, are not present inTerlemezian’s palette of imagery. On the contrary,Terlemezian’s art seems to have been free of explicitscenes of heroism or aestheticization of fighting forthe fatherland.

Yet it would be wrong to maintain for this reasonthat Terlemezian’s art lacked a political meaning.“Art is for man,”116 he declared in a speech in Paris,and this universalism drove both his Realist andnationalist commitments. These humanist impulseswere encouraged by his relationship with CatholicosKhrimian, his patron and close friend. Khrimian,

affectionately known as “Hayrik” (father), was a fervent advocate ofreform for the political and social rights of Armenian people, particular-

114. Братская помощь по-страдавшим в Турции ар-мянам (1898), p. xxxvii.115. Born in Trabzon,Arshag Fetvadjian was one ofthe first graduates of theAcademy of Fine Arts inIstanbul. He continued hisart education in Rome, Italy.See, L.B. Chookaszian, 2011.116. Quoted in M. Kirakosyan,2014, p. 32. Terlemezian wouldlater emphasize that “art shouldserve the working class”(“H0-$&203)' 10); IE$4$70,%05 C$%2*& <$-3$/$&H"%”). Quoted inM. Kirakosyan, 2014, p. 32.Of course, one should proba-bly approach this with cau-tion, as these words wereuttered after his move toYerevan under Stalin’sregime. After moving toSoviet Armenia in 1928,Terlemezian was awardedPeople’s Artist of theArmenian SSR in 1935 andOrder of the Red Banner ofLabour in 1939. Great SovietEncyclopedia, 1980, p. 524;M. Kirakosyan, 2014, p. 36.We can only speculate aboutthe reasons for his apparent“compliance” under Stalin’sregime, which is certainly aninteresting topic for anotherpaper.

140



141

Figu

re 7

Ivan

Kon

stant

inov

ich A

ivaz

ovsk

y, Th

e Mas

sacre

of A

rmen

ians

in T

rebizo

nd in

1895

Cur

rent

loca

tion

unkn

own,

pub

lishe

d in

Бра

тск

ая п

омощ

ь пост

рада

вшим

в Ту

рции

армя

нам

[Fra

terna

l Help

for t

he Su

fferin

g of t

he A

rmen

ians

in T

urke

y], M

osco

w: T

ipol

itogr

. T-v

a I.N

. Kus

hner

ev, 1

898,

p.x

xxvi

i

ly the peasantry. Khrimian was a great educator, and his Van-basedprinting press produced the first Armenian-language periodical inOttoman Armenia (Artsiv Vaspurakani or Eagle of Van). For Khrimian,the reformation and welfare of the people were above all other consider-ations,117 and he identified himself with the interests of the provincialmasses. As such, he was often at odds with the imperial regimes of SultanAbdülhamid II and Tsar Nicholas II, and also with many influentialIstanbul Armenians.118 Terlemezian had a strong relationship withKhrimian. What Khrimian did with his publications and long service inthe highest positions of the Armenian Church, Terlemezian attemptedto do with his life and art; by his endless effort to continue his education,in spite of imprisonments and exiles, and by focusing attention on theordinary lives of peasants and common people: “I loved to watch thestruggle of those sun-burned faces with the earth, to walk next to themas they ploughed their furrows, to listen to them sing their horovels, andto bear witness their lives” he later wrote in his memoirs.119 Optimism

and serenity distinguish Terlemezian’s work frommost of his Russian and French counterparts. Hiscommon people are neither as oppressed as the work-ers in Ilya Repin’s paintings (such as his famous Barge

Haulers on the Volga) nor as tired as the peasants of Jean-François Millet(1814-1875), who bear the stigmata of hard physical labour. Instead ofrevealing the stark misery of lower classes, Terlemezian often chose todepict ordinary people posing in harmony and accommodation withtheir surroundings, as in his 1900 Next to the Well (Près de la Fontaine)[see figure 3, p. 234].

Terlemezian’s Kurd (M*+&<) [see figure 8, p. 237] demonstrates hiscommitment to optimism and his extension of it to every man. Unlikehis portrayals of other common people in their landscapes, however,Terlemezian’s depiction of the Kurd without a setting seems at onceethnographic, but at the same time humane – recalling his prison self-portrait. Here, Terlemezian had the Kurd wear his traditional headgearand what looks like a cavalry uniform and ammunition belt, poking outof which we see the hilt of a heavy dagger. He dwells on the details of theman’s costume and the gun he grips tightly in his hands; he applies hisbrush patiently and persistently to his Kurdish figure, whilst leaving theplain and empty background to his quick and free brushstrokes. The

117. G. Libaridian, 2004, p. 59.118. Ibid., p. 62.119. M. Kirakosyan, 2014, p. 23.

142


seated figure faces slightly away from us, gazing soulfully towards thefloor, past the nozzle of his rifle, which we cannot see. The choice of sub-ject also strikes us for what we know about the relations between Kurdsand Armenians in the Ottoman East: after all, the two communitieswere often engaged in severe political, economic, and social conflict, andTerlemezian himself had had armed clashes with Kurdish tribes early inhis life in Van. Yet lest we reach the conclusion that Terlemezian wasmuch less sympathetic to his Kurdish subjects than the Trabzon-bornFetvadjian, who most likely had little personal encounter with Kurds, wemust understand both Terlemezian and his politics better.

As Gerard Libaridian explains, Kurdish-Armenian relations before1915 were not only coloured by suspicion and hatred due to the plunderand looting of the settled Armenian societies by the Kurdish tribes, butthere was also “a genuine feeling of kinship in someareas.”120 Indeed, the most important leader of theArmenakans, Avetisian (Terlemezian’s cousin),“could not leave the Kurds from his worldview.”Though Avetisian’s ideas were not ultimately realised,he advocated a “common political” programme between Kurds andArmenians.121 In a similar vein, Khrimian, who was highly concernedwith self-defence against Kurdish tribes, also “sought to reach out tothem by understanding their socio-political structure and advocatingagrarian settlements.”122 So it is not too surprising that, after all,Terlemezian represents a Kurd objectively, neutrally, and even sympa-thetically. The invisible, rapacious enemy in Fetvadjian’s The Woman ofSasun, becomes with Terlemezian a common man like the artist himself,without any attempt at dehumanization or “othering,” and if we arelooking for a strong political and social opinion in this portrait, it is per-haps the old humanist credo that, “nothing human is alien to me.”

As an artist, Terlemezian records his subjects and landscapes in apure, unadulterated and unfiltered present, recording what is in front ofhim as he sees it. But what, then, are we to make of the undated paintingtitled A Mother Looking for Her Son Among the Corpses (D$7&'>&*%*+= I F"$/%0&" D0N :& >&<*+%) (undated) [see figure 9,p. 238]? The subject matter and style are uncharacteristic of the artist, tosay the least. In the 1920 Istanbul exhibition, Terlemezian exhibited awar painting called Bloody Feast (?&"+%*) O&$AG$%;), which, in

120. G. Libaridian, 2004,pp. 175-176.121. Ibid., p. 176.122. Ibid.


143

the words of the famous Ottoman Armenian essayist ZaruhiKalemkiarian (1874-1971), depicted the infernal character of the warthe morning after; “the dead bodies on the floor, the bushes still burning,not yet sending up smoke.”123 For Kalemkiarian, the picture proved thatTerlemezian “was influenced by his environment and time.”124 We don’tknow if Terlemezian also exhibited A Mother Looking for Her Son amongthe Corpses in this exhibition, but what is clear is that this specific paint-ing is one of the few works in his œuvre to explicitly thematise the eventsof the genocide, and it is a disturbingly bleak and ambivalent response.125

We see an indistinct mass of corpses piled in the shadow of jagged, whiterocks and circling crows, stretching out towards two heads and a corpseimpaled on spikes in the top right of the composition. The black-cladfemale figure in the foreground seems to clasp one of the corpse’s hands

to her face as its head hangs limply towards the earth,but whether in grief or prayer is unclear. Terlemeziandoes not paint the faces of the naked people, whohave been stripped of their identity. Though themother searches, nothing can single these figures outthem as the unique human beings they once were.Terlemezian haunts us with an image of a pile ofnaked corpses filling a barren and hostile landscapefrom which they are almost indistinguishable. It can

certainly be read as an anti-war painting: its intention is not to express atriumphant heroism, as it would be if he had painted the uprising in Vanas he remembered it in his memoirs, but to show us an apocalyptic set-ting ruled by chaos and bitter agony. Even in this, his most explicit refer-ence to events during the war, we don’t see expressions of heroism, oridealised or glorified images of fighting and battle. Despite its nightmar-ish and disturbing power, the piece seems sketched, rushed or unfin-ished, as if Terlemezian were unsure of or unsatisfied with its effect.

The representation of war and the exploration of memory andremembrance invite us to look again at the painting Terlemezian creat-ed in the midst of the war; his 1915 Sipan Mountain from Ktuts Island[see figure 1, p. 233]. Probably no other painting by Terlemezian cap-tures such a private and delicate moment of his life. In Sipan Mountain,Terlemezian conjures up its distant vastness through a play of light,colour, and perspective between the shore in the foreground and that

123. Z. Kalemkiarian, 1920. 124. Ibid. 125. The very few war paint-ings by Terlemezian in the col-lection of the National Galleryof Armenia are mostly undat-ed, except the 1929 Horrors ofWar (K$)0&$.=" ?&B$-2"&;%0&').

144


incongruous little white sail, glinting across the horizon. In his poem TheLake of Van, Terlemezian’s favourite writer Raffi had written: “Uponthe lake there shone a sudden light; A graceful maid rose from the watersthere; A lighted lantern in one hand she bore; In one a shining lyre ofivory fair.”126 And here again we sense the covert sentiment and inward-ness of Terlemezian’s Realism. Writing his memoirs in Soviet Armeniaafter 1935, Terlemezian wrote about his feelings when he had first seenVan again after long years of absence:

My soul was gently shivering with an inexplicable feeling when I saw myso much missed fatherland; I was unable to speak or breathe. Theextraordinary beauty of the surrounding area and the proximity of theplaces where I lived in my childhood and youth further increased theconstantly smouldering, deep anguish that was enclosed in my heart.127

Terlemezian had been forced for years to leave his family, home, andland, and obliged to be content with a life in which he knew that every-thing around him was temporary and provisional. Terlemezian’s land-scapes are responses to his sense of belonging to theland and its people, but his belonging did not involvea sense of ownership of everything that wasArmenian or a rejection of anything which was not.His attachment to and almost obsessive representa-tion of the land seemed to answer a spiritual need inhim. As Catholicos Khrimian had one of his charac-ters say, “from the day he is born a man needs land,and when he dies he still needs a piece of land to lieunder. That is how it is grandson: land is a matter oflife and death.”128 Terlemezian’s was a life of strenuous exiles; the accu-mulation of its emotional and physical difficulties, the unhealableanguish of being far away from home and his native land, all profoundlydisrupted his soul, but also gave him another, permanently estranged wayof seeing the land. Edward Said has eloquently explained this dilemma:

While it is true that literature and history contain heroic, romantic, glo-rious, even triumphant episodes in an exile’s life, these are not mereefforts meant to overcome the crippling sorrow of estrangement. Theachievements of exile are permanently undermined by the loss of some-thing left behind forever.129

26. A.S. Blackwell, 1917, p. 245.127. Quoted in M. Kirakosyan,2014, p. 29.128. Some sections fromKhrimian’s Papké psak i dasht(Crowned by Grandpa in theField) were translated andpublished in A.J. Hacikyan,2005, pp. 240-241.129. E. Said, 2000, p. 173.


145

Sipan Mountain perhaps does not depart sharply in appearance orstyle from Terlemezian’s earlier landscapes; a picturesque scenery with-out humans to capture and emphasize the pure beauty of what stands infront of him (like his 1911 work Dolmabahçe Palace in Constantinople).And he, again, records the view straightforwardly and directly. But acloser look reveals a much more complex and fragile “present” in the eyesof Terlemezian: indeed, what he omitted is as important as what hechose to represent. Even before the war started, Terlemezian had alreadybeen shocked by the distraction he saw in his hometown. In late summer1914, he was in Aghtamar Island, and wrote of the “lamentable” condi-tion of the place:

The current condition of the island is lamentable […] 30 years agoduring my pilgrimage here, the island was undoubtedly in a much bettercondition, and most importantly there was a great congregation, a com-munity; there was no lack of visitors and the monastery had a thrivingdining hall […] Yet, alas, sculptures were targeted and completelydestroyed.130

The war brought destruction not only in people’s lives, but also inculture and art. Terlemezian, who always had a keen eye for architecture,

does not choose to look at St. John’s Monasterybehind him; most likely already in a “lamentable”condition. In concentrating on creating a vigorousand vividly coloured Sipan Mountain, he obscures

and omits any “fragments” of the war from the view; his desire to pre-serve and memorialize the life he enjoyed in the past and to exalt the“extraordinary beauty” of his homeland occludes any image which mightaggrieve posterity or his future self. This is clearly Realism, but it isRealism of a sentimental disposition. Significantly, this was one of thefew artworks Terlemezian managed to protect as he fled his homelandthat summer.

* **

Terlemezian’s was a life spent between political exile and painting,and between many precarious identities, some hyphenated some not. Yet

130. Quoted in M. Kirakosyan,2014, p. 30.

146


neither his political commitments nor his constant displacements pre-vented him from becoming the most talented of painters, first, ofmodern Ottoman art, and then, of modern Armenian art. Terlemezian’slife and art are of great importance, both as an artistic expression and ahistorical source. As we have seen, his story points to a more cosmopoli-tan and integrated art world in the city of Istanbul particularly after the1908 Second Constitutional Revolution and to a lesser extent during theArmistice Period (1918-1923), where Ottoman Armenians and manyother non-Muslim artists were part of the vibrant art scene. Yet, on theother hand, this chapter of Terlemezian’s story ends with an irreparablerupture from his homeland.

Classifications of Terlemezian as an “Armenian plotter” or“Armenian patriot” are only starting-points, any of which, if taken forgranted, may easily lead us to an already-assumed story of nationalbecoming. Yet it is essential to remember that neither Terlemezian’spolitical nor artistic identity was ever purely one thing, as Turkish andArmenian nationalist (art) historiographies seek to claim. His OttomanArmenian, Diaspora-Armenian, and Soviet-Armenian identities callinto question clear-cut cultural boundaries, posing challenges to nation-alist art histories in the countries formed after the collapse of theOttoman Empire in 1918. One value of examining a story and an œuvrelike Terlemezian’s is that it allows us to raise questions about the cate-gories, histories, and silences we take for granted in the present.

Bibliography

AGHASYAN Ararat, “The Hamidian Pogroms and the Genocide ofArmenians as Reflected in Armenian Fine Arts (1894-1923)”, Journal ofArmenian Studies, 2015, vol. 1, pp. 70-80.

AHMAD Feroz, “Unionist Relations with the Greek, Armenian andJewish Communities of the Ottoman Empire, 1908-1914”, in BenjaminBraude and Bernard Lewis (eds.), Christians and Jews in the OttomanEmpire, New York: Holmes and Meier Publishers, 1982, vol. 1, pp. 401-434.


147

ANAYIS (Yevpimé Avedisian), P*+@0&3 [My Recollections], Paris,1949.

ARTUN Deniz, Paris’ten Modernlik Tercümeleri: Académie Julian’daİmparatorluk ve Cumhuriyet Öğrencileri [Translations of Modernity fromParis: Students from the Empire and Republic in the Académie Julian],Istanbul: İletişim, 2007.

BARDAKJIAN Kevork B., A Reference Guide to Modern ArmenianLiterature, 1500-1920, Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2000.

BILAL Melissa, YILDIZ Burcu, Gomidas Vartabed: Mektuplar, Anılar,Müzikolojik Metinler [Gomidas Vartabed: Letters, Memoirs,Musicological Texts], Istanbul: Birzamanlar Yayıncılık (forthcoming).

BLACKWELL Alice Stone, Armenian Poems: Rendered into EnglishVerse, Boston: R. Chambers, 1917.

CHOOKASZIAN Levon, ?&@$/ Q062$G0$% [Arshag Fetvadjian],Yerevan: Printinfo, vol. 1, 2011.

COLE Alphaeus, “An Adolescent in Paris: The Adventure of Being anArt Student Abroad in the Late 19th Century”, American Art Journal,vol. 8, no. 2, November 1976, pp. 111-15.

DADRIAN Vahakn, The History of the Armenian Genocide: EthnicConflict from the Balkans to Anatolia to Caucasus, Providence, RI:Berghahn Books, 1995.

DAVIDIAN Vazken Khatchig, “Portrait of an Ottoman ArmenianArtist of Constantinople: Rereading Teotig’s Biography of SimonHagopian”, Études arméniennes contemporaines, no. 4, December 2014,pp. 11-54.

DELOUCHE Denise, Peintres de la Bretagne: découverte d’une province,Paris: Librairie C. Klincksieck, 1977.

DERINGIL Selim, “‘The Armenian Question Is Finally Closed’”: MassConversions of Armenians in Anatolia during the Hamidian Massacresof 1895-1897”, Comparative Studies in Society and History, 2009, vol. 51,no. 2, pp. 344-371.

DORRA Henri, The Symbolism of Paul Gauguin: Erotica, Exotica, andthe Great Dilemmas of Humanity, Berkeley: University of CaliforniaPress, 2007.

ELDEM Edhem, “Torosyan Tartışmasını Bitiren Bir Derleme: Tarih,Otobiyografi ve Hakikat” [“A Compilation to End the Torosyan

148


Debate: History, Autobiography, and Truth”], Toplumsal Tarih,no. 261, September 2015, pp. 70-76.

ELDEM Edhem, Osman Hamdi Bey Sözlüğü [The Dictionary of OsmanHamdi Bey], Ankara: Kültür ve Turizm Bakanlığı, 2010.

Great Soviet Encyclopedia, Third Edition, vol. 25, New York:Macmillan, 1980.

GÜLER Abdullah Sinan, İkinci Meşrutiyet Ortamında OsmanlıRessamlar Cemiyeti ve Osmanlı Ressamlar Cemiyeti Gazetesi [TheOttoman Society of Painters and Their Journal during the SecondConstitutional Period], PhD thesis, Mimar Sinan Güzel SanatlarÜniversitesi, 1994.

HACIKYAN Agop Jack, BASMAJIAN Gabriel, FRANCHUK Edward S.and OUZOUNIAN Nourhan (eds.), The Heritage of Armenian Literature:From the Eighteenth Century to Modern Times, Detroit: Wayne StateUniversity Press, 2005.

HALIL Edhem, Elvâh-ı Nakşiye Koleksiyonu [Collection of Paintings],Istanbul: MSGSÜ Yayınları, 2014 [1924].

Hanedandan Bir Ressam: Abdülmecid Efendi [Ottoman Prince andPainter: Abdülmecid Efendi], Istanbul: Yapı Kredi, 2004.

HOVANNISIAN Richard (ed.), Armenian Van/Vaspurakan,Costa Mesa: Mazda, 2000.

HOVANNISIAN Richard, Armenia on the Road to Independence,Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967.

Illustrierter Katalog der XI. Internationalen Kunstausstellung im Kgl.Glaspalast zu München 1913, Munich: Pick, 1913. İZGÖER Ahmet Zeki and TUĞ Ramazan, Padişahın Himayesinde:

Osmanlı Kızılay Cemiyeti, 1911-1913 Yıllığı [Under the Patronage of theSultan: The Ottoman Red Crescent Society, 1911-1913 Annual], Ankara:Türk Kızılayı Yayınları, 2013.

KAYALI Hasan, Arabs and Young Turks: Ottomanism, Arabism, andIslamism in the Ottoman Empire, 1908-1918, Berkeley: University ofCalifornia Press, 1997.

KHACHATRYAN Shahen, R$2" S*+7%': T-04%" ?%<&$<$&U'V$7 W/$&8*+67$% DIN/The Color of Pain: The Reflection of the Genocidein Armenian Painting, Yerevan: Sh. Khachatryan, 2010.


149

KIRAKOSYAN Meri, 9$%*3 X0&50=0.7$%" (7$%;' 0+!)0-E$H*&E*+67*+%' [The Life and Œuvre of Panos Terlemezian],Yerevan: H.H. G.A.A. Gitutyun Hratarakchutyun, 2014.

KLEIN Janet, The Margins of Empire: Kurdish Militias in the OttomanTribal Zone, Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2011.

KUM Burhan, “Gayriresmî Hatırlamak: Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’ndaKimliksiz Ressamlar” [“Remembering Unoffically: Painters withoutIdentities in the Ottoman Empire”], in Aydın Çubukçu, C. Hakkı Zariç,Nevzat Onaran, Onur Öztürk (eds.) Utanç ve Onur: 1915-2015, ErmeniSoykırımı’nın 100.Yılı [Shame and Pride: 1915-2015, the Centenary ofthe Armenian Genocide], Istanbul: Evrensel Bayım Yayın, 2015, pp. 258-286.

KÜRKMAN Garo, Armenian Painters in the Ottoman Empire, 1600-1923, Istanbul: Matüsalem Uzmanlık ve Yayıncılık, 2004.

LIBARIDIAN Gerard J., Modern Armenia: People, Nation, State,New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers, 2004.

LIBARIDIAN Gerard J., The Ideology of Armenian Liberation: TheDevelopment of Armenian Political Thought before the RevolutionaryMovement (1639-1885), PhD thesis, University of California, 1987.

LOTI Pierre, “Constantinople”, in N. D’Anvers (ed.), The Capitals ofthe World (tr. Nancy Bell), New York: Harper and Brothers Publishers,1894.

LYNCH Henry Finiss Bloss, Armenia: Travels and Studies, TheTurkish Provinces, vol. 2, London: Longmans, Green, and Co, 1901.

MAHARI Gurgen, Burning Orchards (tr. Dickran Tahta, Haig Tahta,and Hasmik Ghazarian), Cambridge, England: Black Apollo Press, 2007[1967].

MANSEL Philip, Constantinople: City of the World’s Desire, London:John Murray, 1995.

MARTIKYAN Eghishe, 9$%*3 X0&50=0.7$% [Panos Terlemezian],Yerevan: HayPetHrat, 1964.

NALBANDIAN Louise, The Armenian Revolutionary Movement. TheDevelopment of Armenian Political Parties through the NineteenthCentury, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1963.

NICHANIAN Marc, Writers of Disaster: Armenian Literature in theTwentieth Century, Princeton, N.J.: Gomidas Institute, 2002.

150


NOCHLIN Linda, The Politics of Vision: Essays on Nineteenth-CenturyArt and Society, New York: Harper & Row, 1989.

ORTAYLI İlber, Tanzimattan Sonra Mahalli İdareler, 1840-1878[Local Administrations After the Tanzimat, 1840-1878], Ankara: SevinçMatbaası, 1974.

OSHAGAN Vahe, “A Brief Survey of Armenian Literature”, Review ofNational Literatures: Armenia, no. 13, 1984, pp. 28-44.

PANOSSIAN Razmik, The Armenians: From Kings and Priests toMerchants and Commissars, New York: Columbia University Press,2006.

RAMPLEY Matthew, LENAIN Thierry, LOCHER Hubert (eds.), ArtHistory and Visual Studies in Europe: Transnational Discourses AndNational Frameworks, Leiden, Boston: Brill, 2012.

ROBERTS Mary, Istanbul Exchanges: Ottomans, Orientalists, andNineteenth-century Visual Culture, California: University of CaliforniaPress, 2015.

ROGAN Eugene, The Fall of the Ottomans: The Great War in theMiddle East, 1914-1920, London: Allen Lane, 2015.

SAID Edward, Reflections on Exile and Other Literary and CulturalEssays, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2000.

SOCIÉTÉ DES ARTISTES FRANÇAIS, Salon de 1901: explication desouvrages de peinture, sculpture, architecture, gravure et lithographie desartistes vivants exposés au Grand Palais des Beaux-Arts, Paris: ImprimeriePaul Dupont, 1901.

SOCIÉTÉ DES ARTISTES FRANÇAIS, Salon de 1910: Explication deouvrages de peinture, sculpture, architecture, gravure et lithographie desartistes vivants exposés au Grand Palais des Champs-Élysées, Paris:Imprimerie Paul Dupont, 1910.

SARINAY Yusuf, AKTAŞ Necati, GÜLTEPE Necati and KAPLANMustafa (eds.), Ermeni Komiteleri , 1891-1895 [Armenian Committees1891-1895], Ankara: T.C. Başbakanlık Devlet Arşivleri GenelMüdürlüğü, 2001.

SARIS Mayda, Armenian Painting: From the Beginning to the Present,Istanbul: Agos, 2005.

SARIS Mayda, Istanbullu Rum Ressamlar/Greek Painters of Istanbul,Istanbul: Bir Zamanlar Yayıncılık, 2010.


151

SARKISIAN Mardiros, “Armenian Art Through the Ages”, Ararat,vol. 1, no. 3, Summer 1960, pp. 42-47.ŞERIFOĞLU Ömer Faruk and BAYTAR İlona (eds.), Leonardo de

Mango, 1843-1930: dalla Puglia a Istanbul, Istanbul: Yapı Kredi, 2005.ŞERIFOĞLU Ömer Faruk, Resim Tarihimizden: Galatasaray Sergileri,

1916-1951 [From Our Art History: Galatasaray Exhibitions], Istanbul:Yapı Kredi, 2003.

SHAW Wendy M.K., Ottoman Painting: Reflections of Western ArtFrom the Ottoman Empire to the Turkish Republic, London: I.B. Tauris,2011.

SOULAHIAN KUYUMJIAN Rita, Archeology of Madness: Komitas,Portrait of an Armenian Icon, Princeton, NJ: Gomidas Institute, 2001.

STEINER George, Extraterritorial: Papers on Literature and theLanguage Revolution, New York: Macmillan Company, 1971.

SUNY Ronald Grigor, “Soviet Armenia”, in RichardG. Hovannisian (ed.), The Armenian People From Ancient to ModernTimes, vol. 2, Foreign Dominion to Statehood: The Fifteenth Century tothe Twentieth Century, New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1997.

TEOTIG (Teotig Labdjindjian), ?=I%*+% Y$&0,*7,' [Everyone’sAlmanac], Constantinople: V. and H. Der Nersessian, 1912.

TER MINASSIAN Anahide, “The Role of the Armenian Community inthe Foundation and Development of the Socialist Movement in theOttoman Empire and Turkey, 1876-1923”, in Mete Tuncay and ErikJ. Zürcher (eds.), Socialism and Nationalism in the Ottoman Empire, 1876-1923, London, New York: British Academic Press, 1994, pp. 109-156.

TER MINASSIAN Anahide, Nationalism and Socialism in theArmenian Revolutionary Movement, 1887-1912, Cambridge, Mass.:Zoryan Institute, 1984.

TERZI Naci, “Osmanlı Ressamlar Cemiyeti’nin Kuruluşu ile İlgili BirBelge” [“A Document about the Foundation of the Ottoman Society ofPainters”], Sanat Çevresi, no. 14, December 1979, pp. 12-13.

THALASSO Adolphe, “Orient: Esthétique d’Art des Ottomans”, L’Artet les Artistes, no. 6, October 1907 - March 1908, pp. 503-504.

THALASSO Adolphe, L’art ottoman: les peintres de Turquie, Paris:Librairie artistique internationale, 1911.

152


TONGO Gizem, Painting, Artistic Patronage and Criticism in thePublic Sphere: A Study of the Ottoman Society of Painters, 1909-1918,MA thesis, Boğaziçi University, 2012.

TOPRAK Zafer, “Cihan Harbi’nin Provası Balkan Harbi” [“TheBalkan War as a Rehearsal for World War”], Toplumsal Tarih, no. 104,August 2002, pp. 44-51.

TOYNBEE Arnold (ed.), The Treatment of Armenians in the OttomanEmpire: Documents Presented to Viscount Grey of Fallodon, London;New York: Hodder and Stoughton, 1916.

TROUILLOT Michel-Rolph, Silencing the Past: Power and theProduction of History, Boston: Beacon Press, 1995.

ÜNGÖR Uğur Ümit, “Organizing Oblivion in the Aftermath of MassViolence”, Armenian Weekly, 2008, pp. 23-28.

VARANDIAN Michael, “A History of the Armenian RevolutionaryFederation”, The Armenian Review, no. 23, Summer 1970, pp. 3-21.

WHARTON Alyson, The Architects of Ottoman Constantinople: TheBalyan Family and The History of Ottoman Architecture, London:I.B. Tauris, 2015.

YASA-YAMAN Zeynep, Suretin Sireti: Bir Koleksiyonu Ziyaret/ Beyondthe Apparent: Visit to A Collection, Istanbul: Pera Müzesi, 2011.


153

233

Études arméniennes contemporainesGIZEM TONGO • Colour Illustrations

Figu

re1

Pano

s Ter

lemez

ian, S

ipan

Mou

ntai

n fro

m K

tuts

Islan

d[!"

#$% !$

&' ()*+, (-

.*+,

], 19

15O

il on

canv

as, 7

0 x 9

0 cm

, im

age c

ourt

esy o

f Nat

iona

l Gall

ery o

f Arm

enia

234

Études arméniennes contemporaines Illustrations couleur • GIZEM TONGO

Figure 3 Panos Terlem

ezian, Worker N

ext to the Well[/

01$)$2*&*+3"% /

-45*+&" 6*)

], 1900O

il on canvas, 73 x 90 cm, im

age courtesy of National G

allery of Arm

enia

235


Figu

re4

Pano

s Ter

lemez

ian, D

olmab

ahçe

Palac

e in

Istan

bul[7*89$

-:$1;$

<$8$

)' (*

=)$%>

%*+?

*8=*

+9],

1911

Oil

on ca

nvas

, 48

x 79

cm, i

mag

e cou

rtes

y of N

atio

nal G

aller

y of A

rmen

ia

236


Figure 5 Panos Terlemezian, The Tomb of Sultan Çelebi, Bursa[!*+8@$% AB8$4"" 7$94$&$%' :&*+=$5*+9], 1913

Oil on canvas, 65 x 100 cm, image courtesy of National Gallery of Armenia

237


Figure 8 Panos Terlemezian, Kurd (C*+&>), undatedOil on canvas, 91 x 70 cm, image courtesy of National Gallery of Armenia

238


Figure 9 Panos Terlemezian, A Mother Looking for Her Son Among the Corpses[6$5&' D&*%*+9 E 7"$F%B&" 9BG "& D&>*+%], undated

Oil on canvas, 40 x 32.5 cm, image courtesy of National Gallery of Armenia