Pavel Tchelitchew

Early life Tchelitchew was born to an aristocratic family of landowners and was educated by private tutors. Tchelitchew expressed an early interest in ballet and art. He studied under Aleksandra Ekster at the Kiev Academy, and after graduation worked designing and building theater sets in Odessa and later Berlin from 1920 to 1923.

Career Tchelitchew moved to Paris in 1923 and became acquainted with Gertrude Stein and, through her, the Sitwell and Gorer families. His interest in creating multimedia experiences during this period that drew together painting, film, and dance, led to collaborations with ballet impresario Sergei Diaghilev (stage designer for Ode by Léonide Massine, 1928) and choreographer George Balanchine.

His first U.S. show was of his drawings, along with other artists, at the newly opened Museum of Modern Art in 1930. In 1934, he moved from Paris to New York City with his partner, writer Charles Henri Ford. In New York he continued to work with Balanchine and met his greatest champion and patron, Lincoln Kirstein. He was known for camouflaging bodies and faces into geometric lines or landscaped forms on artwork. He used abstractionism and symbolism to convey both the outer and inner appearance of the object.

Hide-and-Seek

Pavel Tchelitchew, Hide-and-Seek 1940–42, Oil on canvas, 78½ x 84¾ inches (199.3 x 215.3 cm)Hide-and-Seek 6' 6 1/2" x 7' 3/4" (199.3 x 215.3 cm) is in the collection of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York City).

The painting measures 6' 6 1/2" x 7' 3/4" (199.3 x 215.3 cm) and was painted between June 1940 and June 1942. It was acquired shortly after its completion by MoMA. Tchelitchew was given a retrospective of his work at MoMA in 1942. In 1934, he left Tanner for the poet Charles Henri Ford. Ford and Tchelitchew had met shortly after Ford's arrival in Paris in 1933 to publish The Young and Evil.

Death Grave of Pavel TchelitchewTchelitchew died in Grottaferrata, Italy in 1957. His long time partner, Charles Henri Ford, was by his bedside. Tchelitchew's ashes are interred in the columbarium of Père Lachaise Cemetery in Paris.