An Armenian painter and sculptor, born in Tiflis in 1893, died in Annecy in 1980. He arrived to France as a refugee in 1923 and participated in decorating the temple of Angkor for the 1925 World’s Fair; he took lessons with Bourdelle and Despiaux. He was the Winner of the Salon in 1928, he exhibited in 1932 a group entitled “Le rapt” [The Abduction], the original of which is now in the museum of Annecy. He later made a bust of Monsignor Cesbron, the archbishop of the city.

In 1948 he was asked to paint the portrait of King Fouad I in Egypt, and he built a great reputation throughout the Near East. In 1965, he became a professor at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts d'Annecy [School of Fine Arts of Annecy], his adopted city.

An excellent sculptor of monuments, he produced the equestrian statue of General Andranik in the cemetery of Père Lachaise and the memorial to the Melkonian brothers of Nicosia in Cyprus.

Frédéric Fringhian