Arto Tchakmaktchian, R.C.A.

Member of the Royal Canadian Academy since 1991


Born in Cairo, Egypt on June 26th 1933

Contact : arto@naregatsi.org


"The work of Arto, simultaneously defies and demands interpretation.  No one who has been confronted with his unusual world of abstracted human figures can escape a deep fascination and a driving need to know more about its 'hidden' meaning.  This fact, in itself, does not constitute a paradox; true works of art often possess this 'double face'.  They are visible, open to our inspection and simultaneously keep hidden truths in their depthswhich can only be expressed and experienced through them.

No language, neither that of the artist himself nor that of the most discerning critic, can replace this sense of feeling... the feeling of suffering which is the necessary part of the inherent tragedy of the human condition.  Arto's work is a noble definition of humanity, a classical vision of Man that is presented to us in a visible and aesthetically pleasing form."

Dr. Rigas N. Bertos, Art Historian, McGill University


Awards

First Prize - International Contemporary Ceramics Exhibition, Prague, 1962

First Prize - Exhibition organized by the Soviet Peace Committee for a Hiroshima Memorial.  The sculpture, Monument to the Victims of Hiroshima, was offered by the Soviet government to the City of Hiroshima. Moscow, 1964

State Laureate for the Soviet Socialist Republic of Armenia for Mother of the Artist and The Composer Arno Babadjanian awarded at the Contemporary Armenian Sculpture Exhibition, Yerevan, 1968.  Those pieces can be seen at the Tretiakov Museum in Moscow.

First Prize, Wilfrid Pelletier Competition, Montreal, 1984.  The Bust of Wilfrid Pelletier is on display in the entrance hall of Place Des Arts in Montreal.


Exhibitions

1968, Fine Arts Museum of Sofia (Bulgaria)
    Individual exhibition
1970, Fine Arts Museum of Leningrad (USSR)
    Individual Sculptures and sketches exhibition.
1970, Louvre Museum, Paris (France)
    Participation in an Armenian Art Exhibition entitled "From the Urartu to Contemporary Art"
1976, Balliol College, Oxford (UK)
    Individual Sculptures exhibition
1977, T.R.A. Gallery, Montreal (Canada)
    Individual sculptures and sketches exhibition
1979, Place Des Arts, Montreal (Canada)
    Individual Sculptures exhibition
1981, University of California in Berkeley (USA)
    Individual Sculptures and sketches exhibition.
1982, Saddlebrook, New Jersey (USA)
    Group Exhibition
1984, Place des Arts, Montreal (Canada)
    Individual Sculptures and Sketches Exhibition
1990, Saidye Bronfman Center, Montreal (Canada)
    Individual Sculptures and Sketches Exhibition

1995, Bochum Museum, Bochum (Germany)

    Participation in the "Armenian Art and Civilization" exhibit.
1995, France
    Participation in a touring contemporary Armenian art exhibit. Cities visited: Pointivy, Nantes, Mets, Fecan, and Paris