Ara Oshagan: Disrupted, Borders

“Ara Oshagan: Disrupted, Borders” combines photography, collage, installation, and film. “Disrupted, Borders” is now on view in the Adele and Haig Der Manuelian Galleries. Curated by Ryann Casey.

This exhibition has been generously sponsored by Michele M. Kolligian in memory of Haig Der Manuelian for his dedication and foresight in sharing Armenia’s rich history and culture with the world, including an impressive collection of Armenian Manuscripts that he gifted to the Armenian Museum.

Expanding across transnational geographies and interconnected spaces, Disrupted, Borders weaves together several transdisciplinary series of works that address my interest in diasporic identity, afterlives of displacement and colonization, erasure, and (un)imagined futures.

I am interested in diasporic processes and the visible and invisible crossing of physical, cultural, and linguistic borders. My own history and identity is entangled in my work as I live and work directly among disrupted and marginalized communities. In Disrupted, Borders, I employ photography, film, and collage to present a layered and multi-disciplinary vision that intertwines documentary with the imaginary, text with image, fact with speculation, personal history with collective history. Disrupted, Borders entangles past-present-future and considers the afterlives of visible/invisible borders across space and time.

– Ara Oshagan, 2023

Artist Panel at Armenian Museum to Feature Harvard’s Christina Maranci & Hrag Vartanian of Hyperallergic

- Special Weekend of Programs to Include Free Admission and Member Tours -

The Armenian Museum of America will host a series of programs the weekend of September 23-24 highlighted by an artist panel discussing Ara Oshagan’s “Disrupted, Borders” exhibition currently showing in the Museum’s contemporary galleries.

The event will bring Oshagan together with curator Ryann Casey, art critic Hrag Vartanian, and Professor Christina Maranci, all of whom touch upon contemporary art and politics in their respective work.

The panel, titled “The Image as Disruption and Identity,” is free and open to the public, and will take place in the Adele and Haig Der Manuelian Galleries on Saturday, September 23 at 2:00 pm, followed by a light reception. The Museum is also offering free admission for all visitors that weekend, along with free guided tours of “Ara Oshagan: Disrupted, Borders” to its members.

Photography and Installation Explore Issues of Dislocation and Cultural Identity

The Armenian Museum of America (AMofA) recently announced the opening of its next contemporary art exhibition, “Ara Oshagan: Disrupted, Borders.” The show follows the AMofA’s blockbuster exhibit, “On the Edge: Los Angeles Art 1970s-1990s from the Joan and Jack Quinn Family Collection,” which received rave reviews and was viewed by thousands of visitors.

“Disrupted, Borders” at AMofA is an expanded version of what was previously exhibited at Stockton University Art Gallery in New Jersey, and the show is being curated by Ryann Casey. “This exhibition connects many of the diasporic and homeland entanglements that have occupied me over the past decade or more, from Los Angeles to Beirut to Artsakh,” states Oshagan. “The works articulate a certain ‘diasporic liberation,’ as so well stated by Hyperallergic editor Hrag Vartanian in his introductory essay about the exhibit.”

Essays

Ara Oshagan’s Metaphors of Diasporic Liberation

By Hrag Vartanian

The burden of national history can be heavy, and it is often carried by those of us from ancient cultures that refuse to rest on the laurels of the past but are eager to recalibrate ourselves and communities for a new era. In this curious, if nebulous space of refuge and reinvention, where many of us find ourselves trying to reconstitute something that may no longer exists, it is often with the help of the camera that we have been able to root our place in the world, framing and reframing ourselves in a way that posits new ideas of home, family, and belonging.

But for the Happenstance of History: The Art of Ara Oshagan

By Adriana Tchalian

The exhibit features a series of narratives braided together, such as but for the happenstance of history I (also titled “Beirut Memory Project”), but for the happenstance of history II, displaced, Gather (also titled “Artsakh Scrolls”), Shushi Portraits, and That You May Return.

The collages in the series, But for the Happenstance of History I, routinely feature desolate, empty spaces, perhaps as another mode of portraying silence. Oshagan utilizes narrative ambiguity to construct psychologically-charged tableaus steeped in stillness, melancholy, and detachment – almost to the point of aversion.

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New Exhibition at Armenian Museum Tells Stories of the Artist’s Experiences of Displacement

“The mural and manuscript portraits on fabric are some of the largest works that have ever been exhibited in the AMofA galleries. Ara’s innovative style allowed us to bring these larger-than-life images into the space so this installation offers many surprises from color to scale to medium, and a mix of time and place that will resonate with visitors,” explains Executive Director Jason Sohigian.

This four-minute video by Dan Hogan, News Director at WCA-TV, features a live report from our contemporary galleries and interviews about the installation with artist Ara Oshagan and Jason Sohigian.

Catalogue for 'Ara Oshagan: Disrupted, Borders' Published by Stockton University Art Gallery

"Ara Oshagan seamlessly weaves geographies, historical sources, and mediums to consider the impact of dislocation on our personal and collective history,” explains Curator Ryann Casey. “Bringing the past to the present, Oshagan asks us to reflect on our connections to place and community while highlighting the importance of memory on our shared future.” This flipbook was published by Stockton University Art Gallery when they exhibited this show from January 18 to April 6, 2023.

about the Artist

Ara Oshagan is a diasporic multi-disciplinary artist, curator, and cultural worker whose practice explores collective and personal histories of dispossession, legacies of violence, identity, and (un)imagined futures. He works in photography, film, collage, installation, book art, public art, and monument-making. Oshagan has published three books of photographs, is currently an artist-in-residence at 18th Street Art Center in Santa Monica, and a curator at ReflectSpace Gallery in Glendale, CA.

about the Curator

Ryann Casey is a New Jersey based artist, curator, and educator. Casey holds a BA in Photography with a minor in Gender Studies from Stockton University and an MFA/MS in Photography and Art History from Pratt Institute. She currently works as the Exhibition Coordinator at the Stockton University Gallery and is an adjunct Professor of Photography, Art History and Critical Theory. Casey’s current photographic and curatorial projects focus on themes of loss, trauma, and memory.