www.aravot.am asked artist Sahak Poghosyan to express his opinion on one of the most discussed subjects in recent times – statues installed in Yerevan and damaging them.
“I, as a person close to that field, am disgusted with those statues. It is good that the people are so disgusted that they show their attitude. I am talking about not only the statues installed recently, but also the statues erected in the past that are unprofessional and absolutely tasteless. They are not in line with the rules of either esthetics or even ethics and have an impact on a citizen who has a little taste. At the end of the day, the man must not see tasteless things every day,” the architect says.
During our conversation, we also talked about landscaping Yerevan. “It seems they are landscaping, a good thing is being done. However, the thing is how they are landscaping… those pots, primitive ikebana and absolute tastelessness just shouldn’t be done. Instead of pulling the man out of mud, the artist and the man of culture themselves get into mud…. Let me say something barbaric – I am for people’s breaking those statues and I would like the breaking to be an act of vandalism. The man is against and breaks.”
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The artist is against classifying intellectuals: “It turns out that there is a small group of intellectuals and they install those people’s statues, as the Russian saying goes, по второму, по третьему кругу (for a second time, for a third time). Don’t we have any other phenomena, characters? Roughly speaking, this is just a means to make money. The city has turned into a cemetery, and in my personal opinion, there is only one or two statues in Yerevan that correspond to professional standards. Generally, every statue should have its philosophical meaning. It is observed only in the case of the Tamanyan Statue and the statues in front of Matenadaran. Epic character Davit of Sasun can also be perceived as a monument, which was sculpted in accordance with the demands of the time and was of high quality.”
As for decorating entrances and archways, Sahak Poghosyan says that the level of urban development and culture is lower than “rabis” (labor art): “There was a composer by the name of Totik at the time, he had the quality of professional ‘rabis,’ today ‘rabis’ postmodernism is offered to the people as culture…. Now I look out of the window and see vases and pots on the street… they have stuffed this city with pots, the esthetic taste of all of us is not better than a pot. They have appointed someone a designer; he has a terrible taste and decorates our city with that taste. Man, we don’t want a decorated city; we want a clean city.”
Gohar HAKOBYAN
