Both
an artist and a patriot, Panos Terlemezian made a remarkable
contribution to Armenian fine arts in the first half of the twentieth
century. He was born in Van, in the Armenian-populated suburb of
Aygestan, on March 3, 1865, the son of a farmer. His love for painting
was born during his studies in the local elementary school and then in
the Central College of Van (1881-1886).
He
graduated with honors and, afterwards, he taught drawing, aesthetics,
and geography in the schools of Van from 1886-1889. Meanwhile, he became
a member of the first Armenian political party, the Armenagan
Organization, formed in Van. In 1890 he was arrested on charges of
political activities against Sultan Abdul Hamid II, but was freed six
months later for lack of evidence. In 1891 he was arrested again and
sentenced to death, but two years later he was able to escape prison and
go first to Persia and then to Tiflis. After doing menial jobs, in 1895
he went to St. Petersburg to follow studies at an art society school
with a scholarship granted by Catholicos Mgrdich I (Khrimian Hayrig).
His
studies were interrupted in 1897, when the Russian police arrested him
in Reval (now Tallinn, the capital of Estonia) upon a request of the
Ottoman government. He was transferred to half a dozen prisons until he
was secretly exiled to Persia in 1898. He managed to escape again to
Batum, in Georgia, and leave for Paris. In Paris he entered the famous
Julian Academy, from which he graduated in 1904.
Upon
his return to Eastern Armenia, Terlemezian, who had already
participated in collective exhibitions in Paris, created various
paintings inspired by his visits to Etchmiadzin, Sanahin, and other
places. He settled in Tiflis, where he taught at the Nersessian and
Hovnanian schools, and participated actively in cultural life from
1905-1908.
He
traveled to Egypt and Algeria in 1908, and then resided in Paris for
the next two years, where he continued painting. In 1910 he settled in
Constantinople, where he would live until the beginning of World War I.
Here he befriended some of the most prominent intellectuals of the
period, and shared his residence with Gomidas Vartabed. In 1913 he gave
his first individual exhibition in Constantinople and won the golden
medal at the international exhibition of Munich. Returning to Van, he
was one of the leaders of the resistance of April-May 1915 against the
attack of Turkish regular troops. After the retreat of the Russian
troops, he went to Etchmiadzin with the Armenian refugees and then to
Tiflis. In 1916-1917 he became one of the founding members and
organizers of the Society of Armenian Artists in Tiflis and its branch
in Rostov-on-the-Don.
Terlemezian
went abroad in 1920. He lived for a few years in Constantinople, Italy,
and France, and in 1923 he settled in the United States, where he lived
and presented individual exhibition in New York, Fresno, San Francisco,
and Los Angeles during the next five years. He also participated in the
Biennial of Venice (1924).
In
1928 he was invited by the government of Soviet Armenia to return. He
would live in Yerevan until his death. He gave individual exhibitions in
Yerevan and Tiflis. In 1930 he was given the title of Emeritus Artist
of Soviet Armenia and became a member of the Society of Painters of the
Soviet Union in 1932.
Panos
Terlemezian passed away on April 30, 1941. The art school established
in Yerevan in 1921 was posthumously named after him.
