No matter how great Armenia’s trade and economic relations have been, no matter how much Armenia has been a major and well-known transit route for commerce for centuries and no matter how much remarkable Armenia merchants have scattered across the globe, throughout history, Armenia has been known to the world with its architecture, miniature painting, music, literature, its great artists and cultural figures and the great spiritual values that those greats have created. Unfortunately, today, among Armenians there is a common view, and to a extent it is right that arts and culture are on the downfall, better yet, people simply don’t know many individuals endowed with the talent to create, and the mass media don’t touch upon them…However, those individuals continue to create, amaze the world and make people charmed by the ��?colors’ of Armenia, Armenians and everything Armenian. One of those individuals is contemporary Armenian painter and sculptor Gevorg Yeghiazaryan, with whom I had the opportunity to meet and talk in his enormous studio, which is located in one of the outskirts of the city and where 14 Armenian masters convey air and life to the ancient Armenian art, creating works from porcelain and ceramic works, as well as masterpieces. In this small and at the same time large world cut off from the city and noise I saw people who are devoted to preserving and continuing Armenian national traditions.

Hayern Aysor: Gevorg, let’s start our conversation with the simplest facts and truths.

Gevorg Yeghiazaryan: I am a painter. I have no title. My only title is to be an Armenian. I have 17 years of professional experience as a painter. I live for painting. I was born in Gyumri. My father was a craftsman, though he had many preferences and dreamed of becoming a painter. My mother was a teacher. There were no painters in our large family. I received my education at the Merkurov School of Gyumri, after which I studied at the Terlemezyan Art School of Yerevan and the Repin Art Academy of Leningrad. Due to some problems, I left my studies behind and returned to Yerevan where I got accepted to and graduated from the Department of Painting of Yerevan State Institute of Art and Theater. That’s all.

Hayern Aysor: Besides your God-given talent, who do you consider your greatest teacher? Who are you grateful for all that you have achieved?

G. Y.: I have had several teachers who aren’t very well-known. There was a sculptor by the name of Zhora Muradyan from Gyumri. I met him when I was still in the first grade. I loved and was very close with Ashot Hovhannisyan, Rafael Atoyan, Artsrunyan and Hakob Hakobyan. There are a couple of artists who have taught me in their studios.

Hayern Aysor: Who of the great artists and painters of the world have been your teachers?

G. Y.: There are greats that I prefer, like Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, who remain a mystery for me to this day. They are above human conscience. My greatest teachers are Greco, Kolner and Van Gogh.

Hayern Aysor: Do you believe that people haven’t been able to reveal the human and divine enigma and unique talent of those titans and won’t be able to for centuries?

G. Y.: There are things that are created with the help of man’s rationality. There are things that the human spirit helps create. There are also things that are divine by nature and themselves. The latter are the three creators that I mentioned.

Hayern Aysor: How do you think a painter should be as a human being? What kind of person is a painter?

G. Y.: If I view that as a question, that’s one thing, but there is a long formula that goes beyond your question. I am talking about creation. The important thing is not whether a person is a painter, musician, or writer. The important thing is the conscience of the person. There is a conscience that not only derives from logic, or simply rationality, but also spiritual rationality that is associated with creation.

Hayern Aysor: Does a painter always learn, or is there a point where a painter no longer feels the need to learn and take?

G. Y.: My conscience is very different from the conscience that I had a couple of years ago in which I viewed the arts as an act of sacrifice. Art is a person’s sacrifice of understanding and perceiving systems of values in a new way. Art is a way of struggle, but a struggle for values, not existence.

Hayern Aysor: Now let’s be more realistic. How long have you not been in Armenia?

G. Y.: I have not been absent from Armenia, but I have worked in Europe, the U.S. and in the East for a long time. Thank God, I have often been invited from different countries and have been lucky to work with professional artists. When I was a student in 1993, I opened an exhibition in Lebanon, but that was when my friends and I came up with the idea of creating a gallery in Gyumri after the earthquake. Within the scope of that, we organized several exhibitions and carried out rather serious activities. That gallery helped save many painters in the difficult situation created after the devastating earthquake. We organize two international exhibitions in France with the title “Armenian Culture at an Auction”, which brought together Armenian painters. Later, the gallery was closed. I had a professional manager, who was dealing with my works and organizing exhibitions, and I was only painting.

Hayern Aysor: Gevorg, how many exhibitions have you held to this day?

G. Y.: I haven’t counted…I have held about 60-70 personal exhibitions. Seventy percent of my works have been showcased at famous galleries across America, and I have been working with professionals on a contractual basis for the past 20 years now.

Hayern Aysor: So, you are well-known in America. Do American presses write about you?

G. Y.: There are many newspapers and magazines that have covered my work.

Hayern Aysor: People know you abroad, but they don’t know you in Armenia. Doesn’t that concern you?

G. Y.: I don’t know what it means to be well-known or not well-known. I don’t understand it.

Hayern Aysor: Your enormous arts and crafts studio looks like a production unit at first sight. How long has it been open?

G. Y.: It has already been 16 years since my great partners and I undertook the initiative to restore a lost layer of culture, that is, the Kutai-Iznik ceramics, which was once very popular. A major circumstance was what made me take that initiative. At the nearly 30 museums that I have visited, I have seen how that culture of the Armenians is presented as a part of Islamic culture. I experienced something painful at one of the museums in Washington, D.C. where Armenian culture was presented as a part of Islamic culture. I called the section’s correspondent and told her that the culture was Armenian and that it was what the Armenians had created…The Italian correspondent said that every five years, the museum’s representatives are sent on business trips to the countries where that culture can be seen. She added that they had also visited Turkey and Armenia and had seen that that culture exists in Turkey, but not in Armenia and that if the Armenians bore that culture, they would have seen it in Armenia as well…I felt great pain when I heard these words, and that obviously became the reason why I took the initiative to restore that type of Armenian culture in Armenia. Thanks to the Palyans, that culture is only preserved in Jerusalem.

Hayern Aysor: How did you gather this small team of masters? Wasn’t it hard to initiate such a task without being a professional and not having the relevant experts?

G. Y.: Of course, it wasn’t easy. I started reading, examining, learning and consulting. Turkey had published a book devoted to the history of Turkish ceramics in which there was that tree of culture, the first two to three names of which were written as “naghashs”, after which I saw the Turkic names. Even today, that culture is very developed in Turkey and there is a wide market. I traveled to Turkey where I started examining the origins of that art so that I could bring that culture back to Armenia. I sought people specializing in that field of ceramics, as well as artists and craftsmen. We created a small studio in my art studio, worked there for 5 years and went on to obtain a new space. Later, I had the opportunity to import new and modern materials to Armenia and experiment. During that period, we created our own technologies. Since I am not an expert in ceramics and porcelain, I tried to solve the issues related to the art of the external layout. The people who had joined me were also experts of different fields. I traveled to Jerusalem where I studied and held exhibitions at the same time. There were some secrets that they hadn’t taught us. We created new values and qualities ourselves. We were the ones who made porcelain items in Armenia.

Hayern Aysor: Does Armenia have the dust and the material?

G. Y.: No, unfortunately, it doesn’t. We import them. However, whatever we do, we try to do it in our own format. We opened our own website (“Armenian painting”) where we could write a concept paper presenting us and that would show that ours was different from “Chinese painting”, which they refer to as ceramics and that ours had an advantage. They sent us a letter asking what it was about, and we told them to come and see everything on the spot for themselves. The Chinese came, saw our works, were introduced to the advantages and apologized to us. A company like Versace wanted to buy our technologies from us, but we didn’t agree due to several reasons. We tried to continue on our own, and as a result, we got a more perfect material (porcelain) than just the shell. What we are doing now implies opening a school. I have left painting behind and have devoted 15 years to this because this is national culture and it serves the nation and the country. The struggle is actually a struggle for the history. Roughly speaking, we are not after the money. This is the duty of our souls, this is a life that we are living and the awareness that my friends and I have and that is on the record.

Hayern Aysor: Besides painting exhibitions, are these samples of art only orders, or have you showcased them at exhibitions?

G. Y.: Frankly, we have shown some of them as works of art at my exhibitions, but we are still not financially ready to show them as cultural values.

Hayern Aysor: So, you need support…

G. Y.: I avoid using the word ��?support’. If a person understands what he is dealing with, that is one thing. If people help him without understanding, that is a huge problem, and I have already faced that problem. I reject that. We pay in the present, with our awareness, and nobody can do something with only money. If a person understands what he is dealing with, we will cooperate with pleasure. If he is only doing it to provide financial assistance, I have personally been and will be against it.

Hayern Aysor: Which has been the topic of your concern?

G. Y.: Living in harmony with a spiritual person. Painting is like a mirror for me. Knowing oneself through that mirror is a topic that concerns and interests me.

Hayern Aysor: You take orders and create paintings. How can one find you? You don’t have any advertisements. How can one find you and place an order?

G. Y.: Unfortunately, what you are saying is very right and appropriate. It is really hard to find us. We had four websites that I shut down one-and-a-half year ago because I had greater demands.

Hayern Aysor: So, people can find you by word of mouth…And even in that case you have clients, work and get paid.

G. Y.: We exist and work, so yes!

Hayern Aysor: You visited the RA Minister of Diaspora. Is this a new friendship? How do you expect it to continue?

G. Y.: Our acquaintance and friendship are not new. The minister invited me, and we talked about what my partners and I are doing. I have a Diaspora Armenian friend who had already told the minister about us. The minister knew me as a painter, and we talked a lot about the activities aimed at restoring this culture. I believe it wasn’t just a conversation. It will be fruitful.

Hayern Aysor: As a person and as a painter, what amazes you and frustrates you the most today?

G. Y.: Life amazes me, and ignorance frustrates me.

Hayern Aysor: What does the Homeland mean to you?

G. Y.: For me, the Homeland is my type, meaning the air, the water and the land that have nourished me. I was born an Armenian and have fought for the type and quality of an Armenian.

Hayern Aysor: Mr. Yeghiazaryan, who is the best Armenian for you? For me, the best Armenian is…Please continue…

G. Y.: The person who tries to see his conscience that is away from time and personal problems and see his future in discovering that which is divine and the identifying the problems that are eternal. For me, that is what is not only the best Armenian, but also the best person in general.

Karine Avagyan