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SYMBOLS OF DEBATE: INITIATIVE UNDERWAY TO RESTORE HISTORIC COAT OF ARMS AND ANTHEM
By GAYANE ABRAHAMYAN
ArmeniaNow
SOCIETY | 04.12.12 | 13:21
A group of intellectuals have come up with an initiative to change
Armenia's state symbols and have become a target of sharp criticism.
Eminent Armenian actor Sos Sargsyan, writer Levon Ananyan and
publicist Zori Balayan have sent an open letter with 2,208 signatures
to the President, petitioning for the recovery of [Armenian painter]
Martiros Saryan's creation of a Coat of Arms and renowned composer
Aram Khachaturyan's National Anthem. The group is also lobbying for
a cross to be added to the Armenia flag.
Critics object not only to bringing back Soviet-era symbols but also
stress that "other issues the country is challenged with have to be
solved before changing symbols" - issues that the nation's intellectual
don't often get involved in.
Head of the Writer's Union Levon Ananayan counters that "the
intellectuals are active, but do not trumpet it".
"And this is an issue that's always important and has to always be
raised, it's the face of our country, our symbols that have to be
representative and impressive," Ananyan told ArmeniaNow.
Despite the fact that over the past decade the issue of changing the
anthem has been repeatedly raised, it has never gone beyond talks
and discussions.
This time the suggestion is that all three state symbols be changed,
the most important "edit" being the addition of a cross both to the
Coat of Arms and the flag.
The intellectuals are advocating the recovery of Soviet Armenia's Coat
of Arms authored by Saryan, which has Republic of Eastern Armenia
written on it, stressing that the return of Western Armenia is "one
of our legitimate demands".
"The presence of a cross on the flag is highly important, not only
because Armenians are the first nation to have adopted Christianity
as state religion, but because we are a country surrounded by Muslims
and because of being next to powerful Muslim countries foreigners
think we are Muslim, too," historian and ethnographer Lilit Minasyan
told ArmeniaNow.
But, if many share the idea of adding a cross-image to the flag,
the one on changing the Coat of Arms is unanimously rejected.
The three symbols were used in 1988, during the Karabakh Movement,
in Liberty Square during mass demonstrations, "Our Fatherland" anthem
was played, and the tricolor was fluttering in the air. The Coat of
Arms of the First Republic (1918) was presented as the symbol of the
sovereign state.
Months after the declaration of independence - in April - the
Supreme Soviet unanimously approved the Coat of Arms Hakob Kojoyan
and Alexander Tamanyan created in 1920, later restored by painter
Seyran Khatlamajyan.
However, years later it became a target of criticism.
"This issue has been discussed repeatedly and everybody has to be
concerned over its imagery. Armenia is a weak, broken country, that's
not presenting even the symbols of its mighty historic kingdoms,"
painter Karen Aghamyan told ArmeniaNow, however, stressing that
restoring Soviet Armenia's Coat of Arms is not the right solution
either.
Many resent the idea of bringing back the symbols of "totalitarian
Soviet" past. While today's Coat of Arms depicts the four royal
Armenian dynasties, which are the golden pages in the history of
the Armenian nation, also biblical Mount Ararat and the Noah's Ark,
the Soviet emblem had only Ararat.
Political historian Shushan Khatlamajyan stresses that from the point
of view of political studies "if historical conditions have changed,
then the symbol standing for a completely different social regime
cannot be adjusted to a new state which has taken a different course
of development."
"The fact that the Soviet Coat of Arms was created by Saryan should
not be used as a factor here. There was an order from the Kremlin to
create a Coat of Arms, and if at the time it was an act of heroism
to put the image of Mount Ararat on a Soviet state emblem, now the
reality is completely different," Khatlamajyan, the widow of the
painter who restored Armenia's current Coat of Arms, told ArmeniaNow.
"People are trying to return some attributes, symbols of a period when
they had a good life, created and thrived. Often it's a subconscious
desire, and this initiative reveals the fact that people are nostalgic
[of those times]," she says, reminding that: "Russia has recovered
its Soviet-time anthem, because it has pro-empire aspirations and
wants to return the power it used to have, while in our case, what
do we want to achieve by trying to bring back fragments from our past?"
Meanwhile, Martiros Saryan's granddaughter, director of Saryan
house-museum Ruzan Saryan is convinced that by her prominent
grandfather's creation "we will show the world once again that
Armenia and Ararat are concepts of one inseparable unity," and that
"viewing the masterpieces by Saryan and Khachaturyan [the anthem]
through the prism of 'totalitarian past' is medieval prejudice".
Painter, publicist Ruben Mnatsakanyan sees "dangerous and
far-stretching political purposes" behind this initiative.
"General symbols change only in case of a certain system, social
regime changes. If Armenia changes any of its symbols it'd mean giving
up its sovereignty," he told ArmeniaNow, his reference being to the
recently activated discussions of joining Russia's Putin-initiated
Eurasian Union.
By GAYANE ABRAHAMYAN
ArmeniaNow
SOCIETY | 04.12.12 | 13:21
A group of intellectuals have come up with an initiative to change
Armenia's state symbols and have become a target of sharp criticism.
Eminent Armenian actor Sos Sargsyan, writer Levon Ananyan and
publicist Zori Balayan have sent an open letter with 2,208 signatures
to the President, petitioning for the recovery of [Armenian painter]
Martiros Saryan's creation of a Coat of Arms and renowned composer
Aram Khachaturyan's National Anthem. The group is also lobbying for
a cross to be added to the Armenia flag.
Critics object not only to bringing back Soviet-era symbols but also
stress that "other issues the country is challenged with have to be
solved before changing symbols" - issues that the nation's intellectual
don't often get involved in.
Head of the Writer's Union Levon Ananayan counters that "the
intellectuals are active, but do not trumpet it".
"And this is an issue that's always important and has to always be
raised, it's the face of our country, our symbols that have to be
representative and impressive," Ananyan told ArmeniaNow.
Despite the fact that over the past decade the issue of changing the
anthem has been repeatedly raised, it has never gone beyond talks
and discussions.
This time the suggestion is that all three state symbols be changed,
the most important "edit" being the addition of a cross both to the
Coat of Arms and the flag.
The intellectuals are advocating the recovery of Soviet Armenia's Coat
of Arms authored by Saryan, which has Republic of Eastern Armenia
written on it, stressing that the return of Western Armenia is "one
of our legitimate demands".
"The presence of a cross on the flag is highly important, not only
because Armenians are the first nation to have adopted Christianity
as state religion, but because we are a country surrounded by Muslims
and because of being next to powerful Muslim countries foreigners
think we are Muslim, too," historian and ethnographer Lilit Minasyan
told ArmeniaNow.
But, if many share the idea of adding a cross-image to the flag,
the one on changing the Coat of Arms is unanimously rejected.
The three symbols were used in 1988, during the Karabakh Movement,
in Liberty Square during mass demonstrations, "Our Fatherland" anthem
was played, and the tricolor was fluttering in the air. The Coat of
Arms of the First Republic (1918) was presented as the symbol of the
sovereign state.
Months after the declaration of independence - in April - the
Supreme Soviet unanimously approved the Coat of Arms Hakob Kojoyan
and Alexander Tamanyan created in 1920, later restored by painter
Seyran Khatlamajyan.
However, years later it became a target of criticism.
"This issue has been discussed repeatedly and everybody has to be
concerned over its imagery. Armenia is a weak, broken country, that's
not presenting even the symbols of its mighty historic kingdoms,"
painter Karen Aghamyan told ArmeniaNow, however, stressing that
restoring Soviet Armenia's Coat of Arms is not the right solution
either.
Many resent the idea of bringing back the symbols of "totalitarian
Soviet" past. While today's Coat of Arms depicts the four royal
Armenian dynasties, which are the golden pages in the history of
the Armenian nation, also biblical Mount Ararat and the Noah's Ark,
the Soviet emblem had only Ararat.
Political historian Shushan Khatlamajyan stresses that from the point
of view of political studies "if historical conditions have changed,
then the symbol standing for a completely different social regime
cannot be adjusted to a new state which has taken a different course
of development."
"The fact that the Soviet Coat of Arms was created by Saryan should
not be used as a factor here. There was an order from the Kremlin to
create a Coat of Arms, and if at the time it was an act of heroism
to put the image of Mount Ararat on a Soviet state emblem, now the
reality is completely different," Khatlamajyan, the widow of the
painter who restored Armenia's current Coat of Arms, told ArmeniaNow.
"People are trying to return some attributes, symbols of a period when
they had a good life, created and thrived. Often it's a subconscious
desire, and this initiative reveals the fact that people are nostalgic
[of those times]," she says, reminding that: "Russia has recovered
its Soviet-time anthem, because it has pro-empire aspirations and
wants to return the power it used to have, while in our case, what
do we want to achieve by trying to bring back fragments from our past?"
Meanwhile, Martiros Saryan's granddaughter, director of Saryan
house-museum Ruzan Saryan is convinced that by her prominent
grandfather's creation "we will show the world once again that
Armenia and Ararat are concepts of one inseparable unity," and that
"viewing the masterpieces by Saryan and Khachaturyan [the anthem]
through the prism of 'totalitarian past' is medieval prejudice".
Painter, publicist Ruben Mnatsakanyan sees "dangerous and
far-stretching political purposes" behind this initiative.
"General symbols change only in case of a certain system, social
regime changes. If Armenia changes any of its symbols it'd mean giving
up its sovereignty," he told ArmeniaNow, his reference being to the
recently activated discussions of joining Russia's Putin-initiated
Eurasian Union.