Minassian, Kirkor

Kirkor Minassian, (1874-1944) Turkish Armenian dealer-collector from Kayseri in Turkey, which was one of the main centres of carpet and antiquity-dealing in the Near East in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He offered cuneiform tablets to the British Museum in 1894, during which time his Constantinople letterhead refers to him as "Antiquaire, Numismate, etc etc" (ME Correspondence). His name is occasionally mis-spelt as "Kirker Minassian". He set up a business in Paris in 1916, and exhibited a collection (for sale) in America at the Wadsworth Athenaeum in May 1925 where it was observed that he had brought with him to Paris "part of the large collection which he had been years in making. He was one of the earliest connoisseurs to gather the pottery, miniatures, textiles, bronzes and other objects from Persia and the Nearer Orient where he has travelled extensively ... Mr Minassian was the first modern traveler to visit this inaccessible Caucasian town [Kubatchi] in 1904" (Wadsworth Athenaeum, 'Loan Exhibition of Near Eastern Art', Hartford, Comm.: Morgan Memorial, May 1925).
He was an active dealer in Islamic and Near-Eastern antiquities with galleries in New York and Paris. Mr. Minassian was a frequent traveler, making many trips across the Atlantic between Europe and America. He frequented the Near East and India, buying artifacts there for importation and sale into America and European countries. Though the Minassian family closed its New York gallery in 1923, Mr. Minassian remained an active dealer in the New York art market until the end of the decade. He held several public auctions at the Anderson Galleries, Park Avenue, New York. Mr. Minassian maintained an extensive personal art collection which focused upon Islamic ceramics, sculptural objects, textiles, and manuscripts. Though he collected various antiquities from all corners of the ancient world, Mr. Minassian was recognized as a true connoisseur of Near Eastern art. His collection of miniature paintings was of premiere quality.