Yerevan celebrates 130th birth anniversary of Armenian painter Martiros Saryan
28.02.2010 16:02 GMT+04:00
/PanARMENIAN.Net/ Yerevan celebrated 130th birth anniversary of
Armenian painter Martiros Saryan.
To mark the jubilee, Martiros Saryan’s Museum launched an exhibition
of painter’s and his contemporaries’ photos.
After the exhibition, Museum employees, representatives of RA Ministry
of Culture and art connoisseurs visited Yerevan Pantheon to
commemorate the great painter.
An exhibition of Martiros Saryan’s works opened at State Tretyakov
Gallery Friday, January 26.
Martiros Saryan (1880 – 1972), Armenian painter, was born in Nor
Nakhijevan (now part of Rostov-on-Don, Russia).
He first visited Armenia, then part of the Russian Empire, in 1901,
visiting Lori, Shirak, Echmiadzin, Haghpat, Sanahin, Yerevan and
Sevan. He composed his first landscapes depicting Armenia:
"Makravank," 1902; "Aragats," 1902; "Buffalo. Sevan", 1903; "Evening
in the Garden," 1903; "In the Armenian village", 1903, etc. which were
highly praised in the Moscow press.
>From 1910 to 1913 he traveled extensively in Turkey, Egypt and Iran.
In 1915 he went to Echmiadzin to help refugees who had fled from the
Armenian genocide in the Ottoman Empire. In 1916 he traveled to Tiflis
(now Tbilisi) where he married Lusik Agayan. It was there that he
helped organise the Society of Armenian Artists.
After the Bolshevik seizure of power in 1917 he went with his family
to live in Russia. In 1921 they moved to Armenia. While most of his
work reflected the Armenian landscape, he also designed the coat of
arms for Armenian SSR and designed the curtain for the first Armenian
state theatre.
>From 1926 – 1928 he lived and worked in Paris, but most works from
this period were destroyed in a fire on board the boat on which he
returned to the Soviet Union.
In the difficult years of the 1930s, he mainly devoted himself again
to landscape painting, as well as portraits. He also was chosen as a
deputy to the USSR Supreme Soviet. Was thrice awarded the Order of
Lenin.
Saryan died in Yerevan on 5 May 1972. His former home in Yerevan is
now a museum dedicated to his work with hundreds of items on display.
He was buried in Yerevan at the Pantheon next to Komitas Vardapet.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
