Category: General Interest

The Poetic World of St. Nersess Shnorhali by Dr. Jesse S. Arlen at the Catholic University of America

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Last weekend, Zohrab Center director Dr. Jesse S. Arlen traveled to Washington, D.C., where he gave talks on St. Nersess Shnorhali at St. Mary Armenian Apostolic Church and the Catholic University of America. His talk at St. Mary’s parish, at the invitation of Fr. Hovsep Karapetyan, entitled “The Life, Works, and Legacy of St. Nerses Shnorhali 850 Years Later,” considered the great achievements of the beloved catholicos and saint, especially his efforts to bring spiritual and religious truths in a format accessible to laymen and the general population through poetry, songs, and riddles.

His talk at the Catholic University of America, delivered to an audience of graduate students, seminarians, and faculty was entitled “The Poetic World of St. Nerses Shnorhali” and considered the voluminous poetic output of Shnorhali in light of the oral and written Armenian literary tradition of the time. It emphasized the innovation of St. Nerses’ poetic contribution in light of the literary, clerical tradition dominated by prose, as opposed to the largely oral, poetic tradition performed in the songs of the Gusans (Bards), still active in St. Nerses’ time. The talk chronicles the saint’s effort to render Scriptural, theological material in an accessible form that would be appealing to laymen, in a broader effort to replace their love of the ancient, epic, pagan, oral tradition with Christian poetry and songs based on the Scriptural tradition.

A recording of the talk at Catholic University of America may be viewed below.

Vava Sarkis Khachaturian photography collection available at the Zohrab Information Center

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A collection of about one hundred photographs from Vava Sarkis Khachaturian has recently been processed and is now available for the interested public to view at the Zohrab Information Center. The collection was processed by Linda Smith, a graduate student at Simmons University, pursing a degree in Archives Management and undertaking field experience at the Zohrab Center under the supervision of Dr. Jesse S. Arlen.

The Armenian text on the back states that this photograph was taken in Constantinople and that it is the Mouradian family, which was Vava’s mother’s maiden name. The date on the back of the photograph is unclear, but it looks like 1897. Vava would have been two years old, and is thus one of the three children in the foreground of the photograph.

Vava Sarkis was born Vardanoush Sarian in Trabzon, Turkey on February 12, 1895. She spent most of her childhood in Batum, Georgia, living with her parents, five sisters, two brothers, and extended family. Vava later lived in Vienna and Paris, where she modeled for several artists including Henri Matisse. She met Sarkis Khachaturian while taking art lessons from him.

Sarkis was a prolific artist who helped create the Union of Armenian Artists. He studied painting and pedagogy extensively across Europe. He painted works depicting orphans and refugees from the Armenian genocide, as well as painting Armenian churches and religious feast days and themes. Sarkis is well known as the illustrator of Edward Fitzgerald’s Rubaiyat. From 1937 to 1941, Sarkis restored and made copies from temple frescoes in India, saving this art from decay.

Sarkis Khachaturian with members of the Mamoulian family
Sarkis Khachaturian with members of the Mamoulian family. Rouben Mamoulian (seated on floor) was a prominent theater and film director. He became known for his innovations in camera movement and sound in some of the first films that included audio technology, remakes of silent films, and musicals on the stage and screen.

The couple married in 1920. Vava and Sarkis made extended travels all over the world, and first settled in Tiflis (Tbilisi), Georgia in 1923, where Vava described the city as going through an “Armenian renaissance” in several art forms, including painting, art, singing, theater, and opera. Sarkis and Vava continued traveling for work and pleasure before settling in New York in 1941. That is also the year Vava began painting, with her first one-person exhibition opening in the city in the mid-1940s. The couple never had children; in an interview Vava gave as part of Columbia University’s Armenian oral history archive, she stated that “our children [are] our paintings” which she thought was better “because they are living…for eternity.” You can listen to the entire interview here.

Vava and Sarkis in Tiflis (present-day Tbilisi), Georgia, 1920.
Vava and Sarkis in Tiflis (Tbilisi), Georgia, 1920.
From left, Simon Vratzian, Gostan Zarian, Vava, and Arshavir Shiragian at an exhibition of Vava's work
From left, Simon Vratzian, Gostan Zarian, Vava, and Arshavir Shiragian at an exhibition of Vava’s work.
Vava and Sarkis in New York, 1946
Vava and Sarkis in New York, 1946.

Sarkis died in Paris in 1947 after complications from an appendectomy. Vava remained in New York for the rest of her life, and she continued to paint and attended exhibitions of both her art and Sarkis’ art. Vava died of cancer on February 25, 1984 at the age of 89. Vava’s and Sarkis’ artwork can be seen in the National Gallery of Armenia and private collections across the globe.

Vava with singers Zara Douloukhanova, Kay Armen (nee Armenuhi Manoogian), and Lily Chookasian, New York, 1959
Vava with singers Zara Douloukhanova, Kay Armen (nee Armenuhi Manoogian), and Lily Chookasian, New York, 1959.
Vava with Yussof Karsh and his second wife Estrellita Karsh (nee Nachbar), 1970
Vava with Yussof Karsh and his second wife Estrellita Karsh (nee Nachbar), 1970.

This collection provides a valuable picture of the personal life and contributions of two prolific painters and active members of the Armenian community of New York in the early 20th century, as well as other important Armenian figures they knew and loved. This collection of photographs is now available for researchers and visitors to admire and learn from in the Zohrab Information Center’s library. A finding aid of the collection is available to view here.

Vava posing beside her artwork, undated
The last folder of materials contains the only color photographs in the collection, in which Vava is showcasing her artwork while striking poses. The photographs are undated.
Vava posing beside her artwork, undated
Vava posing beside her artwork, undated.

To see a short blog post about Vava with two photographs of her art and a painting that Sarkis did of her, click here.

The National Gallery of Armenia holds much of Sarkis’ and Vava’s artwork. Click here to see entries of two paintings of Vava by Sarkis.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art received a donation from Mr. and Mrs. Nicholas William D’Elia in memory of Sarkis Katchadourian in 1949. Click here to view Sarkis’ “Seated man in European Clothes Holding a Bottle.”

6-part lecture series on St. Nersess Shnorhali available to view on YouTube

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The Vemkar 6-part lecture series “Entering the World, Mind, and Soul of St. Nersess Shnorhali” is available to view on YouTube. Organized in commemoration of the 850th anniversary of the saint’s repose and in response to the pontifical encyclical of His Holiness Karekin II issued earlier this year (ARM ENG), the lecture series began on August 22nd and continued on consecutive Tuesday evenings through September 26th.

The six lectures may be viewed below or on the Vemkar YouTube channel.

Lecture One by Dr. Roberta R. Ervine — “Becoming Shnorhali: On the Context of Catholicos Nerses IV Klayets’i

Lecture Two by Dr. Jesse S. Arlen — “The Poetic World of St. Nersess Shnorhali”

Lecture Three by Matthew J. Sarkisian — “Odes of St. Nersess the Graceful”

Lecture Four by Dn. Hovannes Khosdeghian — “Today the Ineffable (Այսօր անճառ): A Reading of St. Nersess Shnorhali’s Good Friday Song”

Lecture Five by Fr. Mesrop Parsamyan – “St. Nersess Shnorhali and the Threefold Way of Theosis”

Lecture Six by Dn. Andrew Kayaian – “St. Nersess’ Ecumenical Relations with the Byzantines”

Virtual Pilgrimage: Mt. Tabor, In Light of the Transfiguration

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St. Nersess Armenian Seminary Professor Dr. Roberta R. Ervine will lead a virtual pilgrimage to Mt. Tabor to celebrate the Feast of the Transfiguration. This free Zoom live session will take place on July 15, 2023 at 7:00pm.

To register, go to https://tinyurl.com/2kbp8dtw

To learn more about this and other virtual and in-person pilgrimages to Jerusalem, visit: holylandlights.com

Tenny Arlen — To Say with Passion: Why Am I Here? – June 27, 6:30pm

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Atamian Hovsepian Curatorial Practice is pleased to present a bilingual reading of Tenny Arlen’s important book of Armenian verse entitled Կիրքով ըսելու՝ ինչո՞ւ հոս եմ (To Say with Passion: Why Am I Here?) (Yerevan: ARI Literature Foundation, 2021). As one of the first full-length volumes of creative literature composed in Armenian by a US-born author after over a century of Armenian-American community development—this is a landmark achievement. Christopher Atamian, Dr. Jesse S. Arlen, and Arthur Ipek will read and discuss selections from Tenny Arlen’s book of verse.

The event will take place at the new gallery of Atamian Hovsepian Curatorial Practice located at 227 E 24th Street New York, NY, 10010 on Tuesday, June 27th at 6:30pm. Note, the gallery is closed on Tuesdays and will open at 5:30 for this special event.

Please RSVP to info@atamianhovsepian.art

Arthur Ipek awarded Dolores Zohrab Liebmann Fund Fellowship

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The late Mrs. Dolores Zohrab Liebmann was the daughter of the great early twentieth-century Armenian intellectual, writer, and statesman Krikor Zohrab. During her lifetime, Mrs. Liebmann supported students and educational and charitable organizations, with a primary concern to attract and support students with outstanding character and ability, who would hold promise for achievement and distinction in their chosen fields of study.

Through a generous bequest at her death, Mrs. Liebmann created a perpetual charitable trust designated as “The Dolores Zohrab Liebmann Fund” for the purpose of funding advanced education and graduate study grants, which must be carried out entirely in the United States of America.

Beginning in 2022, the Trustees of the Liebmann Fund, at the suggestion of the Selection Committee, decided that the Eastern Diocese would be among the select institutions eligible to nominate one candidate per year for the Dolores Zohrab Liebmann Graduate Fellowship.

The Eastern Diocese is pleased to announce that Arthur Ipek, a Masters of Science student in Cognitive Neuroscience at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, has been awarded the Dolores Zohrab Liebmann Fund Fellowship for academic year 2023–2024. Fellowships cover the cost of tuition and provide a stipend for living expenses.

In 2020, Mr. Ipek earned two Bachelor of Arts degrees from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, in Psychology and Linguistics. While still a high school student, he began interning at the Zohrab Information Center, where he worked for several years between 2015–2017. He has also taught music at Holy Martyrs Armenian Language School. On June 4 of this year, he was ordained to the diaconate at Saint Gregory the Enlightener Armenian Church (White Plains, NY), where he has played the organ and served at the altar since 2020.

With experience in both natural languages (e.g., Armenian, Turkish, French) and programming languages (e.g., Python, R, SPSS), Mr. Ipek is currently pursuing courses in behavioral neuroscience, the cognitive neuroscience of memory, and psycholinguistics during his Masters program. He is also conducting research at the intersection of language, perception, and cognition, conducting studies that measure brain waves upon humans presented with sentences to process.

Mr. Ipek said, “My decision to apply to the fellowship was primarily driven by the legacy of Dolores Zohrab Liebmann and her earnest commitment to research, both to the American community at large, as well as the Armenian community. Apart from the scientific research that I intend to pursue with this generous scholarship, her establishment of the Zohrab Information Center in the heart of the Armenian community, at which I have interned for four years, has been a center of research for scholars of Armenian Studies, looking to enrich their research through its invaluable collections. There I gained experience in the rigor of conducting scholarly research, and I am grateful to be able to continue my graduate research thanks to this generous fellowship.”

The Dolores Zohrab Liebmann Fellowships are awarded only to candidates who have outstanding undergraduate records, have demonstrated a need for financial assistance, are citizens of the United States of America, are enrolled in accredited colleges and universities in the United States, and have received baccalaureate degrees. The trustees welcome applications from students of all national origins who are United States citizens.

Applications for the next cycle of funding will be announced in the Fall.

Upcoming Events: Khachaturian Film & Remarkable Facts About Armenians

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The Zohrab Information Center invites you to attend two upcoming events in NYC.

On Tuesday, June 6th, at 7:00pm, “Khachaturian: An Archival Film” will be screened at Kavookjian Hall in the Diocesan Complex to commemorate Aram Khachaturian’s 120th birthday. Before the screening, introductory remarks will be made by pianist and composer Şahan Arzruni.

On Wednesday, June 14, at 6:00 P.M., under the leadership of Prof. Harold Takooshian, the inaugural public forum titled “Remarkable Facts About Armenians” will be held at Fordham University’s Lincoln Center Campus, 113 West 60th Street (near 9th Avenue), Room 604. There will be discussed not well known facts about Armenians in New York City (Prof. Takooshian) and in three legal matters at turnings points in history (Souren Israelyan, Esq.) that touch upon the existential question as to who we are as people and what makes Armenians so remarkable.

Both programs are free and all are welcome to attend.

Literary Lights: American Wildflowers by Susan Barba in conversation with Jesse Arlen

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Our next Literary Lights event features poet Susan Barba, editor of American Wildflowers: A Literary Field Guide (Abrams Books, 2022) in conversation with Zohrab Center director Dr. Jesse S. Arlen. The event will take place on May 17, 2023 at 7:30 PM Eastern, at the National Association for Armenian Studies and Research (NAASR) in Belmont, Massachusetts (No registration required).

Literary Lights is a monthly reading series organized by the International Armenian Literary Alliance (IALA), NAASR, and the Krikor and Clara Zohrab Information Center. The series, which launched in February 2023, will be held until November in a mixed online and in-person format. You are invited to read along with the series!

American Wildflowers, edited by Susan Barba and illustrated by Leanne Shapton, is a literary anthology filled with classic and contemporary poems, essays, and letters inspired by wildflowers—perfect for writers, artists, and botanists alike.

Zoom Lecture Series on Medieval Armenian Poetry

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Zohrab Info Center director Dr. Jesse S. Arlen will deliver the final two lectures in the St. Nersess Armenian Seminary 2023 Spring Public Lecture Series.

Thursday, March 9th: “Nahapet Kuchak and the Hayren”
Thursday, March 16th: “Sayat Nova and the Ashugh Tradition”

For ZOOM registration, click here. To learn more about the series, click here. To watch the recordings of previous sessions in this series, click here.