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INAUGURAL ART EXHIBITION
Hazel Antaramian Hofman
Jardin d'Erevan, acrylic-based mixed media on canvas, 2013. © Hazel
Antaramian-Hofman, 2013, All Rights Reserved.
Repatriation and Deception:
Post World War II Soviet Armenia
Armenian Museum of Fresno
Opening Reception, March 21, 2013,
5PM-8PM
Audio-Visual Presentation by Artist
6PM
Hotel Diplomat, acrylic-based
mixed media on canvas, 2013.
Hazel Antaramian-Hofman,
2013, All Rights Reserved.
Repatriation and Deception: Post-World War II Soviet Armenia is the
inaugural suite of paintings and drawings by Hazel Antaramian-Hofman
based on over two years of historical and ethnographic research,
including personal interviews with survivors of the Great Repatriation
to Soviet Armenia. Antaramian-Hofman's new body of art is in response
to the stories and photographs that she collected during her visits
with Armenian repatriates who left such Diasporan countries as France,
Egypt, Lebanon, Palestine, and the United States to "return" to an
unknown Armenian homeland soon after the end of World War II. As
the first collection in a series of her works-in-progress, her art
speaks to the paradox of historical circumstance and re-occurrence,
where she constructs and deconstructs the cultural consequences of
migration and the displacement of people over time. The template for
her mixed media paintings includes the artistic paradigm of poster
art and iconic cultural images, and archival documents as the selected
testimony of socio-political ideology. Her drawings reveal segmented
aspects of the repatriate "body," in particular, children of genocide
victims and their Diaspora-born children, all successively fragmented
by politics, social issues, and sentimentality.
About the Artist: Hazel Antaramian-Hofman was born in Soviet Armenia
during the height of the cold war. She is the daughter of two Armenian
repatriates. Her father was born in the United States and her mother
was born in France. Both parents were in their youth when they
"repatriated" to a Soviet Armenia under Stalin. The family eventually
left the U.S.S.R. for the United States in the mid-1960s.
Raised predominately in the United States, Antaramian-Hofman lived
in Wisconsin, later moved to California in the early 1970s. She grew
up never feeling completely Armenian, European, or American. Over
time, she lost the ability to speak in her native language, which was
considered blasphemous by her paternal grandparents. During the last
twenty years, Antaramian-Hofman began her journey to re-connect with
her past and that of her ancestors, including re-learning to speak in
her native language. What has stayed with her over the years is the
question of how to tell her family's peculiar story as it represents
the story of the tens of thousands of Armenian repatriates of the late
1940s. It is now through her art and an audio-visual presentation
where she feels most comfortable sharing the larger story, in part
as tribute to those who survived and to those who perished under the
Soviet system. Antaramian-Hofman received her MA in Arts and Design
from Fresno State University, and her MS in Environmental Policy and
Planning from CSU Fullerton. During her early years as an artist,
she worked as an illustrator in the Los Angeles area after graduating
from the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising.
Show runs from March through May 2013 at Armenian Museum of Fresno
Exhibition Hall (housed at the) University of California Center of
Fresno 550 East Shaw Ave.
Fresno, CA 93710 www.armof.org/
Free Admission
Exhibition Hall Hours: Monday - Friday 9:00 a.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Saturday 9:00 a.m. - 11:00 p.m.
Funding for this Exhibition has been provided by the Armenian Museum
of Fresno, Puffin Foundation, Ltd., and The Bertha and John Garabedian
Charitable Foundation
For more on the Repatriation Art and Ethnographic Project visit:
http://hazelantaramhof-com.webs.com/
To participate in the project: contact the artist at
[email protected]
Hazel Antaramian Hofman
Jardin d'Erevan, acrylic-based mixed media on canvas, 2013. © Hazel
Antaramian-Hofman, 2013, All Rights Reserved.
Repatriation and Deception:
Post World War II Soviet Armenia
Armenian Museum of Fresno
Opening Reception, March 21, 2013,
5PM-8PM
Audio-Visual Presentation by Artist
6PM
Hotel Diplomat, acrylic-based
mixed media on canvas, 2013.
Hazel Antaramian-Hofman,
2013, All Rights Reserved.
Repatriation and Deception: Post-World War II Soviet Armenia is the
inaugural suite of paintings and drawings by Hazel Antaramian-Hofman
based on over two years of historical and ethnographic research,
including personal interviews with survivors of the Great Repatriation
to Soviet Armenia. Antaramian-Hofman's new body of art is in response
to the stories and photographs that she collected during her visits
with Armenian repatriates who left such Diasporan countries as France,
Egypt, Lebanon, Palestine, and the United States to "return" to an
unknown Armenian homeland soon after the end of World War II. As
the first collection in a series of her works-in-progress, her art
speaks to the paradox of historical circumstance and re-occurrence,
where she constructs and deconstructs the cultural consequences of
migration and the displacement of people over time. The template for
her mixed media paintings includes the artistic paradigm of poster
art and iconic cultural images, and archival documents as the selected
testimony of socio-political ideology. Her drawings reveal segmented
aspects of the repatriate "body," in particular, children of genocide
victims and their Diaspora-born children, all successively fragmented
by politics, social issues, and sentimentality.
About the Artist: Hazel Antaramian-Hofman was born in Soviet Armenia
during the height of the cold war. She is the daughter of two Armenian
repatriates. Her father was born in the United States and her mother
was born in France. Both parents were in their youth when they
"repatriated" to a Soviet Armenia under Stalin. The family eventually
left the U.S.S.R. for the United States in the mid-1960s.
Raised predominately in the United States, Antaramian-Hofman lived
in Wisconsin, later moved to California in the early 1970s. She grew
up never feeling completely Armenian, European, or American. Over
time, she lost the ability to speak in her native language, which was
considered blasphemous by her paternal grandparents. During the last
twenty years, Antaramian-Hofman began her journey to re-connect with
her past and that of her ancestors, including re-learning to speak in
her native language. What has stayed with her over the years is the
question of how to tell her family's peculiar story as it represents
the story of the tens of thousands of Armenian repatriates of the late
1940s. It is now through her art and an audio-visual presentation
where she feels most comfortable sharing the larger story, in part
as tribute to those who survived and to those who perished under the
Soviet system. Antaramian-Hofman received her MA in Arts and Design
from Fresno State University, and her MS in Environmental Policy and
Planning from CSU Fullerton. During her early years as an artist,
she worked as an illustrator in the Los Angeles area after graduating
from the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising.
Show runs from March through May 2013 at Armenian Museum of Fresno
Exhibition Hall (housed at the) University of California Center of
Fresno 550 East Shaw Ave.
Fresno, CA 93710 www.armof.org/
Free Admission
Exhibition Hall Hours: Monday - Friday 9:00 a.m. - 7:00 p.m.
Saturday 9:00 a.m. - 11:00 p.m.
Funding for this Exhibition has been provided by the Armenian Museum
of Fresno, Puffin Foundation, Ltd., and The Bertha and John Garabedian
Charitable Foundation
For more on the Repatriation Art and Ethnographic Project visit:
http://hazelantaramhof-com.webs.com/
To participate in the project: contact the artist at
[email protected]