Martiros Sergeevich Saryan

Nikolai Ryabushinsky (1877-1951), Moscow
Alexander Popoff (1880-1964), Paris

M.Voloshin, 'M.S.Saryan' Apollon, November 1913, no.9, p.19 listed under works for 1906 as Poet (tempera), in the collection of  N.P.Ryabushinsky, Moscow
M. Saryan, Iz moei zhizni,  Moscow: Izobrazitel'noe iskusstvo, 1990, p.61, illustrated, p. 293 listed no. 15 as location unknown
I.Hoffmann, Golubaya roza, Moscow: Pinakoteka, 2000, p.114, illustrated
Sh.Khachatryan, Sarian, Erevan and Samara, 2003, p.14 illustrated
Sh.Khachatryan, Martiros Sarian 1880-1972, Ennery: Thalia, 2003, p.95 illustrated

The upper corners are creased, there are losses to the lower corners with further small areas of paintloss around the edges, and a pinhole to the middle upper edge. There are further minor spots of paint loss to the main composition in places e.g the sky. Held in wooden frame under museum glass.
"In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective, qualified opinion. Prospective buyers should also refer to any Important Notices regarding this sale, which are printed in the Sale Catalogue.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF BUSINESS PRINTED IN THE SALE CATALOGUE."

Executed circa 1906.

This exceptionally early work was originally in the famous collection of Nikolai Ryabushinsky (1877-1951) – son of a millionaire, bon viveur and passionate collector, he was also an important driving force behind the Golubaya roza and Zolotoe runo exhibitions, a progressive artistic editor and key in bringing to Russia important Fauvist works by Derain, Braque, Matisse, Marquet. From 1906 to 1909, Ryabushinsky sponsored and edited the Zolotoe Runo journal, occasionally writing for it under the pseudonym N.Shinsky:

'It is not enough to buy and collect paintings' he wrote, 'One must also be able to grasp and understand them, to follow a particular school or several schools together as a visual encapsulation of an epoch of painting' (N.Shinsky, 'Iskusstvo, ego druz'ya i vragi', in Zolotoe Runo, 1908).

The Poet is a superb example of the multitude of influences in Saryan's earliest work: a dream-like Oriental atmosphere, with all the lyricism and mystery of the Russian Symbolists combined with the bold colours of the Fauvists, whose work he had seen in Moscow, and the hot palette of his homeland (fig.5). His first trip to Armenia in 1901 had made a profound effect: "My first journey...was a staggering event for me. It was, you might say, the thing that determined my subsequent course" (A.Kamensky and Sh. Khachatrian, On Saryan, Pages of Art Criticism. Opinions of Contemporaries, 1980, p. 458). 'The multitude of sounds of nature and the rocks whose dark contours in the twilight seemed to have been erected by a skilful architect put us in a romantic mood. Nature can sometimes gather a man into her fold, like a mother pressing her child to her breast" (as quoted in Sh. Khachaturian, Martiros Sarian, p.9).

The fantastical, one-eyed creature in The Poet appears in The Comet, (fig.3, 1907) and Near the Pomegranate Tree (fig.4, 1907). This 'offspring of another world' (Razdolskaya, p.18) was of significant symbolic importance to Saryan, as he explained: 'This image is the poet, the philosopher, as the ancient Egyptians painted the all-seeing eye, which saw and penetrated the entire beauty and infinity of the universe. I am that man' (as quoted in Khachaturian, Martiros Sarian, p.65).

Nikolai Ryabushinsky was once described as coming 'straight from a painting by Kustodiev... a bit of a poet, a dilettante-artist, a musician... At every theatre premiere, every opening night, everywhere that people in the know gathered, you could be sure to see the stocky, sure figure and bearded face of N.P.Ryabushinsky dressed in a smoking jacket or in a well-cut suit from a fashionable tailor (p.268).'

His exotic villa The Black Swan in Petrovsky Park in Moscow was notorious for its excessive décor and extravagant parties. It housed an extraordinary collection, with contemporary painting by the new generation of Moscow Symbolist painters Pavel Kuznetsov, Nikolai Millioti, Petr Utkin and Sergei Sudeikin, exhibited alongside Rodin sculptures, works by Lucius Cranach I, Pieter Bruegel, Nicolas Poussin, Persian vases, Majorcan dragons and Indian carvings.

In 1914 Ryabushinsky set up an antique business in Paris, emigrating to France for good in 1922. He was an artist in his own right, and Kees van Dongen wrote the introduction to his 1926 solo exhibition catalogue in Paris. The Poet later transferred to Alexander Popoff in Paris, a collector with one of the most significant and expansive collections of Russian art of the previous century.