Kelekian, Dikran G., 1868-1951 |
print view
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role
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Dealer/Gallery Collector |
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dates
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1868-1951 |
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city
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New York City |
| state | NY | | other cities | Anatolia, Turkey; Istanbul, Turkey; Paris, France; |
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sex
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M |
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historical notes
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Dikran G. Kelekian was an Ottoman-born Armenian art dealer and connoisseur, known for his role in introducing Islamic, Persian, and Coptic art to collectors and museums in the United States and Europe. Widely regarded as the “dean of antiquities” among New York art dealers, Dikran Kelekian played a central role in shaping Henry Walters’s Coptic, Early Christian, and Classical collections (which became part of the Walters Art Museum in Baltimore) as well as George Blumenthal’s Gothic collection. After opening an art and antiquarian business first in Paris in 1891 and then in Constantinople the following year with his brother, Kevork Kelekian, he came to the U.S. in 1893 as commissioner of the Persian Pavilion at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Soon after, he established the gallery Le Musée de Bosphore in New York and became a trusted source for Islamic and Near Eastern works of art. His clients included collectors Henry Walters, John D. Rockefeller, Jr., H. O. and Louisine Havemeyer, Isabella Stewart Gardner, and Charles Lang Freer, as well as museums around the world. Kelekian collected and promoted the artwork of his friends Mary Cassatt, Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Milton Avery, Marsden Hartley, and other contemporary artists.
Kelekian’s son, Charles Dikran Kelekian (1900–1982), worked closely with him in the business and shared his passion for collecting, taking over the business after his father's death in 1951. |
decades
of activity | 1880-1890
1890-1900
1900-1910
1910-1920
1920-1930
1930-1940
1940-1950 |
| website | http://www.archive.org/details/klkiancollec00kelerich |
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updated
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11/24/2025 10:11:49 |
bibliographic
search |
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Archives/Repository |
Collection Title |
Collection Details |
Archives of American Art
Victor Building, Suite 2200 |
Elsa Schmid papers, 1910-1967. |
see details... |
Archives of American Art
Victor Building, Suite 2200 |
Alfredo Valente papers, 1941-1978. |
see details... |
Freer Gallery of Art and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Archives
Freer|Sackler, Smithsonian Institution |
Charles Lang Freer Papers 1876-1931 |
see details... |
Archives of American Art
Victor Building, Suite 2200 |
Albert Duveen art reference files, [ca. 1831-1950]. |
see details... |
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Please see individual record for location |
Kelekian Archives |
see details... |
The Cleveland Museum of Art
Ingalls Library and Archives |
Records of the Director's Office: Frederic Allen Whiting, 1913-1930 |
see details... |
The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Please see individual record for location |
Robert Lehman papers, ca. 1880s-1977 |
see details... |
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