Author: Arsine Chaltikian

YEREVAN – The My Armenia Program has launched a project with CyArk, a California-based non-profit organization that uses new technologies to capture, archive and share the world’s cultural heritage with the global community. In Armenia, CyArk will be scanning the historical Noravank monastery and the Areni-1 cave complex in Vayots Dzor province, as well as design products that promote and share Armenia’s cultural heritage in and beyond the country. These two iconic sites are, respectfully, of historical and archaeological significance.

Thanks to new virtual reality (VR) headsets, visitors are now able to virtually experience the magnitude and beauty of a heritage site, captured in every detail by CyArk’s scanning devices. Through motion tracking tools, users not only see the site but are also able to move virtually through the site and explore the surrounding area. These kind of virtual experiences are great for presentations during public events such as travel trade fairs, museums and educational institutions in order to interest and engage tour operators, researchers and other interested parties in the opportunities and experiences Armenia can offer.  The My Armenia Program and CyArk will collaborate to design virtual and visual products that will be showcased at museum exhibits, including the 2018 Smithsonian Folklife Festival in Washington, D.C., as well as trade shows, marketing and investment events. CyArk will also process the acquired data to develop photorealistic virtual reality experiences to allow visitors appreciate Armenia’s unique cultural heritage, thus increasing global awareness of Armenia as a cultural tourism destination.

As part of My Armenia’s partnership with CyArk, a four-day workshop was also held at the Tumo Center for Creative Technologies for students and cultural heritage and architecture specialists. The training provided an overview of the three technological tools – photogrammetry, aerial imagery, and 3D scanning – CyArk will employ to document the Areni-1 cave complex and the Norovank monastery. Workshop activities included hands-on training with the equipment, scanning of sample sites in Yerevan, and data processing. Participants reviewed the captured data and learned about software applications for development of tourism materials such as virtual tours and videos. Workshop participants were also invited to follow CyArk’s field activities in Vayots Dzor to help promote the sustainability of such activities in the future.

The My Armenia program is funded by USAID and implemented by the Smithsonian Institution. My Armenia supports the sustainability of Armenian cultural heritage through the development of an inclusive and dynamic tourism sector that engages and benefits Armenian communities across the country.

For more information, please contact: Nune Hayrapetyan, My Armenia Program Communications Specialist at +37455050168 and [email protected];

Please also check out facebook.com/MyArmeniaProgram/ and    folklife.si.edu/cultural-sustainability/my-armenia/Smithsonian.

The much-anticipated screening of “Vahé Oshagan: Between Acts,” a film by Hrayr Anmahouni will take place on Tuesday, October 24, at 7 p.m. at the Glendale Downtown Library. The screening will be followed by a panel discussion with UCLA professor Hagop Kouloujian and Taline Voskeritchian, a professor at Boston University and the American University of Armenia. The program will be introduced and moderated by Professor Peter Cowe, the Narekatsi Chair of Armenian Studies at UCLA.

“Vahé Oshagan: Between Acts” is a literary biography of the pre-eminent writer and intellectual of the modern Armenian diaspora.

The film infuses the traditional documentary with visual, sound-text, and scholarly interpretations of Oshagan’s poetry and prose. It features readings and commentary by Oshagan of his own poetry, as well as analyses by well-known literary critics Krikor Beledian, Krikor Chahinian, Marc Nichanian; and electronic compositions by Ohannes Salibian.

Originally commissioned in 1994 by the Hamazkayin Cultural Association, Western Region, US. It was part of the cultural events celebrating Oshagan’s fiftieth jubilee that took place worldwide in 1994-1995.

Since then, several changes and additions have been made to the original. The upscaling and English subtitles of this final version have been made possible through generous grants from the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation and the Hamazkayin Educational & Cultural Association.

This landmark documentary shows clearly how Oshagan’s work ranges from the gritty realm of the quotidian to the urgent world of politics to the existential questions that animate living and dying. As Oshagan says, reading his own work toward the end of the film: “squatting under the mossy, thick fences of chaos having understood nothing, unable to move or to stay there and not even return…”
“’Vahé Oshagan: Between Acts’ leaves us as viewers with dirt stuck in our soles, longing lodged in our hearts, and politics pressing on our limbs,” said David Kazanjian Professor of English Program in Comparative Literature and Literary Theory University of Pennsylvania “This is everything an intellectual might want in a biography, and simultaneously everything one might want in a biography of an intellectual. It offers a genuine sense of Vahe Oshagan’s work, from his own readings to the major critical thinkers and their perspectives on his oeuvre.

“Simultaneously accessible to any viewer and rich enough for any scholar, this film is the definitive audiovisual work on Oshagan and a model for would-be film biographers,” said Anahid Kassabian, Aslop Professor Emerita, University of Liverpool Sound, Music and Film Scholar.

“A truly unique film about one of the most radical diasporan Armenian poets of the 20th century,” said Arto Vaun, Senior Lecturer Director, Center for Creative Writing English & Communications Dept. American University of Armenia.