On Monday, December 14, 2015, more than 80 art lovers had assembled at "Demirian" Hall of the Armenian Cultural House in Paris to watch Arto Pehlivanian’s film "Painted after the Genocide″ (Peindre après le Génocide) dedicated to historian Armen- Glot Mutafian’s father, painter Zareh Mutafian (1907-1980).
Armen Mutafian delivered the opening speech of the event organized by the Hamazkayin Paris Chapter. He told that Arto Pehlivanian had started to shoot his father’s posters, pictures and paintings upon his request at the exhibition opened in May of the previous year in the 5th Quarter of the city. The exhibition was organized in commemoration of the Armenian Genocide victims.
Later, the director thoroughly studied the painter’s art and concluded that in every phase of his life, the artist had expressed his feelings and emotions in a completely new style and with new colors, which "perfectly displayed the inner world of the artist orphaned in early childhood and the entire history of his fugitive people".
After Mutafian’s speech, the presentation of the one-hour film started. Each picture or portrait displayed in the film was accompanied by a relevant piece of music and Armen Mutafian’s corresponding description.
Zareh Mutafian was born at the coast of the Black Sea, in Samsun. At his eight years of age, in 1915, he witnessed the massacre of his entire family. He spent his childhood in orphanages and lived a wanderer’s life. From Greece, he moved to Italy, where he studied art at Milan’s Academy of Fine Arts (Beaux-Arts) and upgraded his art skills.
Then he relocated to Switzerland and eventually settled in Paris, where soon he became a part of the intellectual circle of the time. There he dedicated himself to literature in parallel with painting. He exposed his paintings at numerous of exhibitions, which were highly assessed by people of art.
Zareh Mutafian was a renowned Armenian intellectual and French artist for 40 years. He overcame his pain, studied the European culture, but also maintained his eastern spirit. He was a symbol of the Armenian Genocide.
In 1965, an exhibition was organized in commemoration of the 50th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. The works of the Italian classic artists, the wonderful French coloristes, the expressionists, and later Ponar and Mattis inspired the Armenian thinker artist. Apart from Europe and later the United States, he exhibited his works in the Soviet Armenia (1967 and 1971).
Artist Mutafian, mainly drawing symbolic images, is famous also for his portraits, seascapes and colorful scenes. The theme of the "survivors" always pursued him at various stages of his life, though he seldom touched upon the subject of Genocide, and had restraint attitude to it.
The film dedicated to Zareh Mutafian’s life and work contains documents and photographs researched by Professor Arto Pehlivanian.
It was really a significant presentation and a nice event dedicated to art.
The organizers of the event provided the audience with DVDs of the film.
