Living Room

Twelve artists from multiple disciplines; dance, music, art therapy, sound art, visual arts, etc., have joined the second edition of Art and Social Transformation Lab. From 6. – 10. May the artists, alongside the facilitator and guest lecturers have delved into their own practices examining the interconnectivity of art creation and social transformation in times of crisis. 
The laboratory was designed as a learning and experimenting space for the artists to reflect and develop their art projects in conversation with other artists in the room. The community of the Living Room is growing. Also this year, three projects were imagined and designed collectively.

(dis)unity 
(dis)unity is a project consisting of two exhibitions accompanied by sound installations. 
The first exhibition: Line, is a spatial and emotional exploration of the boundaries between people and the world around them through photography. 
The second exhibition: Look, This Is My Grandpa features old photographs from family archives whose owners no longer know who is depicted in the images.
In both exhibitions, history, context, objects’ properties and sounds will be the main observation points of the sound installation.
Artists: Asmik Aleksanyan, Margarita Egoryan, and Vardan Harutyunyan

Saved to Abandonment
The project aims to compile and visualise stories of the people, who survived the 2023 military assault and landed in Armenia. But their life was like leaping from one inferno to another, as their families either suffered casualties, or they became outcasts.
The project aims to hold interviews and discussions with people who have found themselves in hard life situations after the exodus, to document them in text and photos for a small exhibition in the Living Room. The final presentation will include the real-life presence of the stories’ heroes and a discussion. 
Artists: Lusine Vanyan, Elina Gasparyan, and Armine Vanyan.

Find Your Inner Power (Գտիր քո ներքին ուժը)
A two-day series of art sessions Find Your Inner Power for children aged 6 – 12 in the Lori region whose mental health state was directly or indirectly affected by the conflict. The goal of the art sessions is to promote mental health healing, and to help children gain inner strength and support.
Artists: Bela Pogosian, Maria Sinanyan, and Gurgen Baghdasaryan
 

The Sound and Movement Compositions Lab is an integral part of Memoryal Project – Tsaved Tanem, an artistic research project exploring transgenerational memory, trauma, and resilience within the (im)material practices of Armenian culture. It was designed and is led by Berlin-based artist, curator, and writer Anika Krbetschek, and G.URBAN, a cultural and social platform fostering community between Armenia and Germany.

Between 21. and 30. April, participating artists and curators translated their personal relationships with (transgenerational) memory into sound and movement. 

A central image was the red thread, serving as a metaphor for the traces memory weaves into individuals.

Using the Memoryal material archive from Anika Krbetschek’s previous field research, sound and gesture were interwoven into a knotted, carpet-like structure of remembrance.

During the Open Process Day, guests were invited to accompany the lab for one day. The curators prepared a set of cards featuring questions, visual material from the research, quotes from conversations, and reflections from the collaborative laboratory.

The project, which began in 2024, aims to document and explore knowledge, experiences, and emotions in Armenia and within the Armenian diaspora in Germany, through an interdisciplinary, participatory, and collaborative approach.

The Living Room has invited and hosted Anika to work with seven sound artists and individuals from movement backgrounds, such as dancers, actors, or performers, to explore personal memory practices.

The artistic focus aligns with the theme Weaving the Immaterial, contrasting with Weaving Material.

In January 2025, For This Dance I Will Take the Lead brought together audiences at the Living Room in Yerevan for an intimate and transformative dance performance. Six participants – each with the shared experience of always being “led” by others – stepped into leadership, guiding the audience through unique choreographies they created themselves.

This performance was the culmination of an open-call project led by artist Tellervo Kalleinen and choreographer Tsolak Mlke-Galstyan. Over weeks of rehearsals, participants – many with no prior dance experience – crafted personal and expressive dances, reclaiming ownership through movement. The project provided a safe and collaborative space for self-expression, allowing each participant to share their story in a powerful and immersive way.

The event supported by the Finnish Cultural Foundation, was a testament to the power of dance in fostering connection, empowerment, and personal transformation.

For its first international activity in the Living Room, artasfoundation invited artists, art educators, researchers, and cultural practitioners to join a seven-day laboratory on art and social transformation. The laboratory was designed as a learning and experimenting space for 10 – 12 participants to create artistic practices engaging with communities, encouraging them to take control of their lives and deal with past, present and future struggles through creative methods.

We wish for a supportive community of practice to grow to empower artists in their interaction with the uncertainty in today’s world, re-examining of the role of contemporary art in peaceful social transformation.

Participating artists and cultural workers have used the laboratory as a space to collectively develop their project ideas. As a result, three projects will be realised in the Living Room:

Where is your Safe Space #7, a performance art project led by Tereza Davtyan, curator, Petros Ghazanchyan, dancer and Inna Ghazaryan, dancer. The project is an evolving performance art series that explores the multifaceted concept of safe spaces in our increasingly complex world.

Transparent – Narratives from Artsakh, a project led by Stella Loretsyan, writer and Lusine Mlke-Galstyan, musician. The project will support ten Nagorno-Karabakh Armenians in sharing their personal stories transforming them to art works showcasing through two events and intensive involvement of local and international media to reach a wider audience.

Home is where your Heart is, an art therapy project led by Ani Galstyan, visual artist, Eliza Baghdiyan, musician and visual artist, Timofey Bichkov, art historian and visual artist, and Anna Tenenbaum, visual artist. The project aims to support forcibly displaced people to deal with experienced traumas. 

Besides the activities organised by artasfoundation, the Living Room will also host other projects that simply need a space to work. The physical space is accessible for artists, organisations and communities involved in social transformation and looking for a space to practice, rehearse, gather, exchange, perform or simply meet.