About
Our association, whose activities are conducted on a not-for-profit basis, aims at achieving the promotion of Armenian arts of different disciplines and activities (e.g. exhibitions and concerts).
Our special focus will be laid on initiatives of artists who are looking for the roots of their Armenian identity and who transform their explorative search into the driving force of creativity. And so tradition becomes modern again: if tradition is not understood as museum, but helps to develop new and unique forms of expression.
FROM DISASTER TO THE ARTS
"My first stay in Armenia happened in 1991. It was about building a new paediatric hospital in by that time Leninakan, today’s Gyumri. The previous hospital had been completely destroyed by the disastrous earthquake of December 1988. I shall never forget walking through the ruins left of Armenia’s second largest city.
The new paediatric hospital was built from 8.4 million € of donations by Austrian citizens and opened in summer 1992, when we handed it over to the respective Armenian authorities. It was named “The Austrian Paediatric Hospital”. But the catastrophic bottlenecks in everyday supply in the young Armenian Republic jeopardized its operation again and again. But we never stopped to take care and so I went to Armenia several times. Doing so I also mingled with the local in-crowd of artists, a lovely scene looking for new ways, in contrast to the miserable conditions around.
The hotel I chose for my stays was a meeting place for them and I had many lively exchanges there. Today this hotel’s name is rightly “The Berlin Art Hotel”, which displays pieces of art of regional artists in all its rooms.
When we commemorated the 20th anniversary in Vienna of Gyumri’s disastrous earthquake by means of a charity concert with “The Armenian Spitis” group, I met Karen Asatrian. He offered me many insights to the world of Armenian music. Until then I knew melancholic folklore only, underlined with Duduk-tunes. Asatrian knows to open new perspectives to the tradition of Armenian folk music by means of today’s stylistic devices such as classic and jazz.
In the area of fine arts Vard Hrachyaanyan deserves attention. Asatrian, who did his studies in Yerevan, lives in Austria (Klagenfurt) for many years already. Vardanyan is from Gyumri, where he completed his studies at the Art College in 2010.
I have been following and supporting his artistic development since he was eighteen years old. His latest initiative was the founding of the ODA Cultural Center in Gyumri. What Karen Asatrian is trying to achieve in music, he does in other genres: making Armenian traditions newly accessible in the tension between the past and the future.
In 2025, we expanded our activities by inviting people to cultural trips to this country in the South Caucasus. Armenia's gateway to the world is wide open!
Hans Döller, chairman