It is difficult to say to what extent Istanbul was a fateful impact on Georges Artemoff in terms of his artwork, but in terms of his personal life it certainly became one. In Istanbul, Artemoff met his future wife, artist Lydia Nikanorova, who had also left the Russian Empire and who also later moved to France.
At a young age the artist attended drawing classes in Rostov-on-Don, as well as Konstantin Korovin’s classes at the Moscow School of Painting, Sculpture and Architecture. Here is what Artemoff, whose father was a Cossack chieftain, had to say about his passion for painting: “When I was very young, I started to draw and paint. This is very rare among us; the Cossacks are horsemen, dancers, musicians, singers, but not painters” (Ruffié 2018, 15–16). Before the First World War, he managed to organise a solo exhibition, participate in various collective exhibitions and even work with Montparnasse artists in Paris, where he ended up thanks to a scholarship. He was evacuated to Istanbul with units of the White Army. He produced a lot of work there, mainly landscapes and portraits, but a contemporary newspaper article noted that he “worked with cheap paints that quickly lose colour”, which suggests that he had limited financial means. In order to acquire greater visibility for his work, Artemoff joined the Union of Russian Painters in Constantinople and took part in two of their major exhibitions (including Exhibition of Russian émigré artists at Taksim Military Barracks). As mentioned above, he also met his future wife, painter Lydia Nikanorova, in the city. From Veniamin Kaverin’s novel we learn about Artemoff living “in the very heart of old Istanbul with its mosques, colourful bazaars, ruins of old baths and city walls” and about his visit to the Kariye Mosque (Chora Church) with Lydia Nikanorova and Nikolai Kluge in 1923. However, it has transpired that Kaverin, who was believed to have written his novel based on Nikanorova’s letters to her mathematician friend Pavel Bezsonov, in fact, most likely wrote it mainly based on her friend’s answers, since Nikanorova’s letters from Istanbul have not survived (Kulakova 2017, 489–490). So, there is a high probability that he was making up a lot of things for the artist. Our knowledge of his Istanbul period is unfortunately incomplete as most of the work he produced during that time was sold. However, some of it can be seen in Paul Ruffié’s book, including some landscape painting (sheaves of wheat), Kariye Mosque, and some theatrical scenery drawings.
Having fought on the French side in the First World War, Artemoff was granted a visa and in 1923 left for Paris, convinced that he would achieve success there. He was proved right. In France, he became a member of the Union of Russian Artists in France, worked as a sculptor and as a painter, and received gold and silver medals for participation in the salons. After the death of his wife in 1938, he created several works with religious themes. In 1942 he married for a second time, to the artist Jeanne Astre, a student of Maurice Denis, and from 1952 lived in her house in Revel. After World War II, he held about 20 solo exhibitions in a number of different French cities, including Paris, Nice, Toulouse and Cannes. Today, one can see Georges Artemoff’s works in the Musée d’Orsay in Paris, the Musée Toulouse-Lautrec in Albi, the Musée Goya in Castres and many other famous museums.