Tribute Leon Markarian naive painter

��Lévon Markarian was born in 1906 in Ermenyköy (Haykur in Armenian) a small port of the Marmara Sea near Panderma.
     In 1914 the Markarian family, made up of 6 children, are thrown out and deported to Adana.
     In 1921 Lévon returns to Ermenykoy with the family, but the exactions continue.
     On the 10^th August 1922, Karékine, Lévons father, in agreement with him decide to leave the country.
     At 9pm in the evening the Markarian family embarks the sailing boat, leaving their home and their belongings in their little fishing village.
     They cross the Marmora Sea and due to the storm, they are obliged to stop in Tekirdag. Crossing the strait Dardanelles in the night, the climb up to Alexandroupolis and then arriving in Cavalla in Greece where they sold their boat. They stay there for some time until they move onto Salonique.
     On the 25^th March 1925, they arrive in the port of Marseille. Lévon leaves his family in Aix en Provence to go to Nice and joins a building company.
     Lévon then becomes Léon on the 28^th February 1928 and on this day he marries Lucie Floresta, installing his family defiantly in Nice.
     It was in 1956 that he starts painting, as his passion never left him since his childhood. And in 1971, when he retires, he masters his art, thanks to his love for painting and for the poetry that it gives out.
     In 1983, Léon becomes very ill while sleeping, and paints passionately until his death in 1990, leaving some remarkable work.