A view of the exhibition “A Curse That Turns Gold Into Ladybugs.” (Credit: Youssef Itani/Courtesy of Marfa’ gallery.)
"Ten years ago, my great-aunt Anahid gave me a memoir dedicated to her father's village in the Ottoman Empire. This book detailed the village's history, its flora and fauna, local traditions, the grammar of its dialect, and documentation on the weeks of resistance during the genocide. It even included some hand-drawn maps, showing the relative location of the village compared to others nearby. Armed with this book, I set out in search of the village," writes Vartan Avakian in the statement for his exhibition "A curse that turns gold into ladybugs," showing till Sept. 25 at the Marfa’ Gallery.It is through the lens of these words that one should approach the "reading" of the series of paintings displayed on the immaculate walls of the Beirut gallery — delicate cartographic variations unfailingly...
"Ten years ago, my great-aunt Anahid gave me a memoir dedicated to her father's village in the Ottoman Empire. This book detailed the village's history, its flora and fauna, local traditions, the grammar of its dialect, and documentation on the weeks of resistance during the genocide. It even included some hand-drawn maps, showing the relative location of the village compared to others nearby. Armed with this book, I set out in search of the village," writes Vartan Avakian in the statement for his exhibition "A curse that turns gold into ladybugs," showing till Sept. 25 at the Marfa’ Gallery.It is through the lens of these words that one should approach the "reading" of the series of paintings displayed on the immaculate walls of the Beirut gallery — delicate cartographic variations unfailingly...
