politically fearless” terrifyingly dark” emotionally wracking” dives beneath surface musicality to find humanity” |
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METROPOLITAN MUSEUM OF ART / Mary Kouyoumdjian and Atom Egoyan's They Will Take My Island
Ongoing The Metropolitan Museum of Art presents the digital world premiere of Armenian-American composer Mary Kouyoumdjian and Oscar-nominated Armenian-Canadian filmmaker Atom Egoyan's MetLiveArts commission, They Will Take My Island (2020), a highly personal 30-minute video with performances by the JACK and Silvana string quartets.
They Will Take My Island is a collaboration between Kouyoumdjian and Egoyan over their mutual admiration of the Armenian painter Arshile Gorky, who has been highly influential to their work, and is a musical documentary hybrid infused with themes of family and immigration. The work integrates audio and film footage from Egoyan's Ararat, a film that explores the life of Arshile Gorky in the context of the Armenian Genocide and modern life, and A Portrait of Arshile, a film Egoyan and his wife Arsinée Khanjian made in dedication to their son, named after the painter. It also includes interviews with Saskia Spender, granddaughter of Arshile Gorky and President of the Arshile Gorky Foundation; Parker Field, Managing Director of the Arshile Gorky Foundation; and Michael Taylor, Chief Curator of the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. Intensely moving, boldly beautiful, this could be the future of a new kind of documentary” |
PAPER PIANOS/ commission by Alarm Will Sound & EMPAC March 9, 2022
Paper Pianos is an evening-length multimedia work exploring the dislocation, longing, and optimism of refugees. The piece combines narratives from four refugees and resettlement workers: the Afghan pianist Milad Yousufi, Getachew Bashir (Ethiopia), Hani Ali (Somalia), and Akil Aljaysh (Iraq). Recordings of the protagonists from interviews conducted by creators Mary Kouyoumdjian (composer) and Nigel Maister (text and staging) are incorporated with the intricate hand-drawn animations of visual artist Kervork Mourad to vividly depict the dramatic emotional landscape of displacement and resettlement experienced by refugees throughout the world. |
NEW YORK PHILHARMONIC/ commission for "Project 19" POSTPONED
Sound ON: Be Prepared! Sound and stimulation are set to “on” at this new-music series at The Appel Room, overlooking Central Park. The second season begins with Philharmonic musicians performing music for prepared instruments, including in World Premieres by Mary Kouyoumdjian and Melinda Wagner, commissioned by the Philharmonic as part of Project 19, and works from the 20th and 21st centuries — in a concert hosted and curated by Nadia Sirota, Creative Partner. |
JEFF ANDERLE, MINNESOTA PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA, & ONE FOUND SOUND/ Clarinet Concerto Spring 2022 The Minnesota Philharmonic Orchestra, the Minneapolis-based ensemble that foregrounds the musical talents of the GLBTQA+ community, and One Found Sound, the San Francisco-based conductorless democratic orchestra, co-commissions a concerto for clarinet and orchestra by Kouyoumdjian, which will be premiered by clarinetist Jeff Anderle. The Minnesota Philharmonic Orchestra and One Found Sound will premiere this work respectively in St. Paul (June 4, 2022) and San Francisco (May 21, 2022). |
SAN FRANCISCO SYMPHONY/ presents WATER AND DUST with violinist Helen Kim and Post:ballet ongoing
Water and Dust pulls its inspiration from author and journalist Mark Arax's book The Dreamt Land: Chasing Water and Dust Across California, which was recommended by dear friend Samuel Adams upon discovering our shared upbringing in the Bay Area. Arax investigates the water crisis and interweaves his family's narrative as Armenian immigrants to California – Water and Dust draws from personal memories of driving the dry stretches of farmland on Highway 5 with my own Armenian family's relocation to the state. Special thanks to collaborators Post:Ballet, the San Francisco Symphony, and especially to the extraordinary violinist Helen Kim, who so thoughtfully gives this piece its grit and flow. |
TIME MAGAZINE/ interview
TIME Magazine interviews Mary Kouyoumdjian, along with human rights activist, Simon Maghakyan, for journalist Madeline Roache's article "What Biden's Recognition of Armenian Genocide Means to Armenian-Americans." |
ADORATION/ commission by Beth Morrison Projects & OPERA America
Kouyoumdjian wins OPERA America commissioning grant to create an opera adaptation of filmmaker Atom Egoyan's film Adoration with Beth Morrison Projects, librettist Royce Vavrek, director James Darrah, and music director Julian Wachner. An adaptation of Atom Egoyan’s film of the same name, ADORATION follows Simon, an orphaned high school student. As part of a dramatic writing exercise, Simon’s teacher encourages him to appropriate details from a historical terrorist attack as an event perpetrated by his parents. When his story goes viral, Simon uses the hysteria within his community and on the internet to highlight the challenges of intolerance and racism in our society. The fictional and actual circumstances of the loss of Simon’s family are revealed in fragments, only fitting together with the final revelation that the prejudices of Simon’s maternal grandfather led to his parents’ deaths. |
Featured Video
They Will Take My Island is a collaboration between myself and filmmaker Atom Egoyan over our mutual admiration of the Armenian painter Arshile Gorky, who has been highly influential to both of our work. The work integrates: (1) audio and film footage from Egoyan’s films Ararat, a film that explores the life of Arshile Gorky in the context of the Armenian genocide and modern life, and A Portrait of Arshile, a film Egoyan and Arsinée Khanjian made in dedication to their son, named after the painter; (2) interviews conducted and recorded by the myself with art historians and family of Gorky’s. Score performed by JACK and Silvana Quartets and mixed by Jascha Narveson.
Commissioned by the Live Arts Department at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and premiered by The Met on January 26, 2021
Commissioned by the Live Arts Department at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and premiered by The Met on January 26, 2021
Header photo by Desmond White