A Portrait of Arshile by Atom Egoyan

portrait of arshile from P S on Vimeo.

You are named after a man who painted a portrait of himself and his mother.

You are named after a man who based his portrait on a photograph that was taken
inin Van, Armenia 1912.

The boy in the photograph was eight. His mother, a devoutly
religious woman was named Shushanik dor Marderosian Adoian. Her son. The person you're named after, was called Vosdanik

Your name is Arshile.

You are named after a man who adored his mother and was inspired by her love of
nature and her pride of Armenian culture and language.

You are named after a man who seven years after the photograph was taken would
hold his mother in his arms as she died of starvation. The year was 1919. The city was Yerevan.

The boy was 15.

You are named after a man who would look at his mother's face staring back at him
from a photograph in 1912 and -would be afraid of disappointing her. of bringing shame to his name. So. Vosdanik Adoian changed his name to Arshile Gorky.

You are named after a man who changed his name because of what he felt when he would remember his mother's face. His mother's face now stares from a gallery wall into a land she never dreamed of.