My practice is a process of collecting and distorting. I work with what I find—whether fleeting moments of memory, the raw scraps of life, or the detritus of society. These fragments, once twisted and reconfigured, reveal not a single truth but multiple, shifting perspectives. The result is a collage of the mind, a scrapbook of the soul, where contradictions and ambiguities are not resolved but allowed to coexist. In this way, my work becomes a map of the human condition—an exploration of impulses, tensions, and distortions. It is less about clarity and more about provoking thought, reflection, and the recognition that existence itself resists simple narratives.
I was born in Soviet Armenia in 1958 and graduated from the Yerevan Institute of Architecture in 1980. My entry into contemporary art began in the early 1990s, after the collapse of the USSR, when the upheavals of social and political transformation pushed me toward new forms of expression. Since then, my artistic explorations have unfolded across multiple mediums, styles, and contexts, often blurring boundaries between personal memory and collective history, politics and poetics, fragility and grotesque.
In 2001, I represented Armenia at the 49th Venice Biennale, and in 2002 I was awarded an ArtsLink NY and Vermont Studio Center Fellowship in the United States. Drawn to the energy of the U.S. art scene, I relocated to Los Angeles, where I exhibited in major galleries (Coagula Curatorial, La Luz de Jesus Gallery, Aqua Art Miami, Bruce Lurie Gallery, Bleicher Gallery, Garboushian Gallery, Centro Arti Visive “Pescheria” in Italy, among others). Alongside my former partner, I co-founded Black Maria Gallery, a space that became an influential voice in the LA art scene.
Over the years, I have collaborated with creative industries including V-Moda, Will.i.am Productions, and Hustler Magazine, while continuing to pursue politically and socially engaged projects. Among my recent exhibitions are Borderline Reality (2014), staged inside the Armavir Penitentiary with inmates and supported by the OSCE; Love is Actually Electric (2016); Inside of the Presidential Suite (2018); and The Bunker of Authoritarianism (2023).
Since 2015, I have been based in Armenia, actively contributing to its contemporary art landscape. Living in a region marked by unpredictability and upheaval, I see the present as a moment of profound transformation—dark, intense, yet inspiring. It is precisely within these tensions that my art continues to evolve.
