Today was very special. Thanks to my new friend Lousnak, I visited an amazing house/museum belonging to the artist/collector Lusik Aguletsi. Earlier in the day, I caught a quick 15 minutes of one of the HighFest aerial programs at Freedom Square, and visited the NPAK Experimental Art Gallery. The latter was of special interest to me because they have a permanent gallery dedicated to Armenian diaspora art. I love the idea of keeping a dialogue going with Armenians globally.
Lousnak and I met at the Aguletsi Museum restaurant garden. It is part of the home, and the ambience is very special. Lousnak ordered her favourite dishes for us, including “amarayin” (vegetable) dolma filled with rice and beef, sarma (grape leaves filled with turkey), a lentil and apricot spread, a topik (chickpea spread filled with onions and walnuts, and her favourite, “hazaran belbul”, a warm salad with cherry tomatoes , Kalamata olives, herbs and fried chicken bits. Homemade bread, lavash, and a glass of wine rounded out the meal. We chatted until with only 45 minutes left to close the museum, I rushed to have my tour.
Lusik died in 2018, and her family has since created an amazing museum filled with her collection of Armenian arts and crafts, traditional costumes, jewellery, and other interesting objets d’art. Many rooms in the house are presented in the same manner as the home when the family lived there. Lusik’s own art (paintings and dolls) along with her husband Yuri Samvelyan’s sculpture, are also on view. Even the talented children and grandchildren’s work is displayed, emphasizing that this is a home as much as it is a museum.
And what a home it is. Over time, an addition was built to incorporate a tree, still a centrepiece of the home and part of the courtyard. The unique wooden railing for the staircase is carved and designed by Yuri. Every nook and cranny is artfully filled with a story. Lusik was not just a collector and artist; she was an Armenophile and ethnographer. This is a museum that anyone interested in Armenian cultural life must visit. The restaurant is also wonderful, and not to be missed. And, we were gifted with their delicious walnut and apricot-filled gata on departure. In short, I will let a few photos try to tell the story of a wonderful Armenian woman and an amazing house/museum!
Below, just a few of the Aguletsi House/Museum treasures…
