Advertisement
Published: September 29th 2023
Edit Blog Post
Day 23 Yerevan Armenia
It’s our last full day in Armenia.
Our objective today is to get inside the National Museum of Art and National History Museum, both within the same building on Republic Square.
Last time we went on a Monday when it was closed, but on a Thursday we should have success.
We arrive on foot and enter the front door. First ticket seller, ‘The museum is closed’. ‘No flash please’.
We don’t understand, we lazily expect to have more information (in English) having acquired little or no Armenian language. She turns to her colleague who says ‘The museum is closed’. ‘No flash today’.
We still haven’t understood........... but there are no lights on ............ ‘flash’ is meaning lighting / electricity. It’s the same problem we had at our first visit to the Saryan art gallery.
We debate whether this is to do with the troubles? We’re sharing the Republic Square with many government ministries, there are police everywhere some, outside the Foreign Affairs Ministry with riot shields and helmets.
Undaunted we head to the nearby Vernissage’ flea market. I resist buying a duduk.........
Marion buys some small presents at a ceramics stall.
On returning to Republic Square we find the Museums are open and electricity restored. We commence on the top floor of the Art Museum.
There is a room devoted to seascape painter Aivasovsky. For a lad from land-locked country he has done very well. He’s been a 19C traveller beyond normal expectations. E.g. The first picture was inspired by a storm in the Bay of Biscay on a trip from England to Spain. They are beautifully painted pictures with a translucence to the water that is uncanny. One of the few pictures of landscapes is a large canvas of Noah descending from Mount Ararat, and one can see why it has its status as many Armenian symbol of identity.
There’s a room of 18C French rococo furniture presenting a typical parlour of the rich in Yereman high society of the time. And a temporary exhibition of ‘The Nude’ examining the cultural role of nude paintings in power and gender politics, and over time.
A further room is of full size replicas of ancient church murals....... it’s a great vaulted space. It’s good that they are
preserved, I suspect many will have been lost in their original churches, all repurposed or bulldozed in the 1920-1990 era. But they don’t fill me with wonder. If anything, it’s the detail, e.g. the naivety of some of the face painting, that interests, like the way eyes and noses are portrayed with simple formulaic brush strokes.
There are a few Saryan mountainscapes on free-standing display boards in the middle of the space which attract me more with their characteristic hightened colour palette and bold brush work.
Downstairs there’s a room of Armenian Impressionism. Take, e.g. Grigor Sharbabchian 1884 -1942. Like many Other European artists at the start of 20C he went to Paris, studied there, rubbed shoulders with the well known French Impressionists but is little known about outside Armenia. His ‘Red Sail Brittany’ pushes all the right buttons for me. And likewise with Panos Terlemezian 1865-1941 with his ‘Portrait of a Worker’.
In Eastern Europe, eg. Sofia, Zargreb, and Budapest we’ve been excited by exactly the same gamut of Impressionist artists unknown outside their own country.
We retire to Baguette and Co, just across the Square for a cup of tea.
The History Museum is set out as a very comprehensive time-line over two (very large) floors. It’s the immensity of the very well displayed exhibition that hits one as the voyage through a collection of archeological artefacts begins.
From flints to pots, to Iron Age then Bronze Age, the skill of craftspeople is mind boggling to this man who depends too much upon the hammer and battery power tool To make anything as fine.
There is every size of ‘karas’. Karas, the brand of red wine that we like so much, is named after the generic term ‘karas’ for a pitcher or amphora, which can describe any vessel from tiny jug to 2m high oil containers.
Each era from millennia BC onward is marked out with burial remains and inscriptions, giving information of the kings and queens of the ever changing Urartu / Ararat once encompassing land from Black Sea to Caspian Sea. Because of its geography as a crossroads between West and East, North and South its form has kept changing through history.
Just as we were exploring the last room, a temporary exhibition of Armenian carpets from 19C to
present day, the lights failed and we were guided by torches to the front door in a well rehearsed drill.
We finish the sightseeing with a mosey around the Armenian Apostolic Cathedral. Newly built, in pink sandstone, it’s a simple but big affair. There are pews! There is no iconoclast but two screens of stone on either side of central image of Mary and Child. There are no icons to kiss and it’s light and airy.
We head homeward around the Circular Garden in an anti-clockwise fashion sandwiched between two circular traffic-jammed roads. Numerous fountains, outdoor bars, children’s play parks punctuate the green strip with block paved footpaths to follow. It’s surprisingly pleasant in a very urban setting. It’s crossed by radial roads where there are underpasses or zebra (yellow and black) pedestrian crossings. We pass the fountain of all fountains at about 3 o’clock on our oversize clock. It looks like a giant candle chandelier made in wrought iron, 10min diameter with water jets instead of candles.
Back on familiar territory near the Cascade Sculpture Park there’s a fine end of terrace elevation with a mural from last year’s Street Art Festival.
The Kamancha Restaurant is our first choice for our last Yerevan evening feast. But we’re told the live music we enjoyed so much last time has been suspended during the country’s troubles.
So a fittingly romantic meal at the Black Cat instead. Starters with a magnificent Tuna Tradito: slices cut from a log of barely-warmed tuna coated in bread crumbs and loaded with finely chopped tomato. Alongside Babaganoosh with pine nuts and a creamy dip for corn chips. Followed by stir fry mains in a sticky spicy sauce. Yum.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.066s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 11; qc: 30; dbt: 0.0358s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb