Culver City,
California
x
Maker: Sdimian, S.A.
NKAO
Date Made: 1991
Country: Soviet Union
Measurements: 60 cm x 90 cm; 23 5/8 in x 35 7/16 in
The Russian acronym at the top left of the work, “NKAO,” stands for the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast, a highly contested geographical region in Azerbaijan whose population is of majority Armenian descent. In 1921, Stalin placed the entire region under Azerbaijani control, and the NKAO was officially established on July 7, 1923 with the Azerbaijan Soviet Socialist Republic. In 1987, a civil war started between the Armenian and Azerbaijani factions of the NKAO and surrounding areas, and so in 1991 the NKAO was dissolved and replaced by the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, whose borders extend beyond the NKAO borders to Armenia and Iran. The Nagorno-Karabakh Republic is not recognized internationally as a part of Armenia, although its inhabitants consider themselves to be Armenian and reject Azerbaijani rule. The monument central to the work, the two adjacent figures of a man and a woman with a tear on her face, is a replica of the monument “We Are Our Mountains,” a 1967 work by Sargis Baghdasarya located in Stepanakert, the capital of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic. The actual monument, also known as “Grandma and Grandpa” in Armenian, is carved from volcanic ash and represents the mountain people of the Karabakh region. The addition of a single tear on the woman’s face alludes to the violence over the autonomy of the region, for the civil war continued even after 1991 when the republic was established and this painting was made.
Accession Number: 2009.053.026
Item Name: Painting
Credit Line: The Ferris Russian Collection, Donated by Tom and Jeri Ferris
Collection/Series: The Ferris Russian Collection, Donated by Tom and Jeri Ferris