The exhibition of Estonian contemporary graphic artists “The Surprised Eye“ in Yerevan, Armenia

Foundation KulturDialog Armenien participated with its three artists Tigran Sahakyan, Arman Vahanyan, and Tigran Kirakosyan in the Armenian-Estonian cultural mission, June 12–16, 2013. Thanks to the Foundations initiative and sponsoring and in cooperation with the Association of Estonian Printmakers, these three artists were invited as ‘artists-in-residence’ to come to Tallinn for 4 weeks. Here, they were given the possibility to work in the offset printmaking studio Albatross Editions (Tigran Sahakyan, Arman Vahanyan) and the association’s printing studio (Tigran Kirakosyan) from March 15 – April 15, 2014. Their works were then presented in the National Library of Estonia in the special exhibition “Striding Imprints. Tigran Sahakyan, Arman Vahanyan, and Tigran Kirakosyan in Tallinn”.

As the result of this productive cooperation, the exhibition “The Surprised Eye” opened on Friday, 26 June at 4 pm. In return it presented a comprehensive choice of 126 works by 34 contemporary Estonian graphic artists at the premises of the Artists’ Union of Armenia in Yerevan. Additionally, the exhibition showed the best 25 examples of contemporary Estonian book printing of the year 2014. This exhibition was made possible thanks to the initiative and sponsoring of Foundation KulturDialog Armenien, in cooperation with the Association of Estonian Printmakers, with the Ministry of Culture of Estonia and the Estonian Cultural Fund, the sponsoring and support of the Estonian Embassy in Armenia and the Cultural Ministry of Armenia. The trilingual catalogue (Armenian, Estonian, English) accompanying the exhibition containing an art historical contribution of Vappu Thurlow was presented the day of the opening and was available at the Artists’ Union of Armenia during the whole time of the exhibition. As part of the side program of the exhibition “The Surprised Eye”, a 3 hours workshop with Tarrvi Laamann on the topic of the Japanese method of wood-block printing took place on Friday, June 27, 2015, at 1 pm. Participants of all ages were invited to join without preliminary notice.