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Dimensions: image size : 39.5 by 55.5cm., 15½ by 21¾in.

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Provenance: The Collection of Akim Tamirov, USA

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Notes: With music by A. A. Arkhangelsky to P. P. Potemkin's libretto, Platov's Cossacks in Paris was first performed by Nikita Balieff's Chauve souris company at the Théâtre de la Madeleine in Paris in the autumn of 1926. Dobuzhinsky was called upon to design sets and costumes for this satirical piece based on the exploits of the renowned, one-eared Cossack general Platov and his troops during the occupation of Paris in 1814. This is a unique opportunity for collectors to acquire the frontispiece and endplate of Dobuzhinsky's original folio of 14 designs for the production. Akim Tamirov, the son of a wealthy Baku oil magnate, studied at the Moscow Arts Theatre under Stanislavsky. He made his name in musical comedy with the Chauve souris theatre company, where he met the designers Nikolai Remizov, Sergei Sudeikin and Dobuzhinsky. After a tour to the United States in 1922, Tamirov settled there permanently to work. It was at this point he started his great collection of Russian art, building close friendships with Russian émigré artists such as Konstantin Somov and who visited New York in 1923 to organise an exhibition. Over the course of forty years, Tamiroff became one of Hollywood's greatest character actors, and the only actor to work with Cecil B. DeMille, Preston Sturges, Orson Welles and Jean-Luc Godard. He received two Academy Award nominations for Best Supporting Actor The General Died at Dawn (1936) and For Whom the Bell Tolls (1943)