Sergei parajanov best movies
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Celebrating 100 Years of Soviet Filmmaker Sergei Parajanov
For six decades, Sergei Parajanov’s films have graced the cinema, reaching international acclaim while challenging their audiences. As the art world reflects on the 100 years since his birth, so too can political and social thinkers.
In 1924, Parajanov (or Paradzhanov) was born to Armenian parents in Soviet Tbilisi. Born into an artistic family, Parajanov would attend the prestigious Gerasimov Institute of Cinematography (VGIK) in Moscow, Russia before working and residing in Ukraine. Director of influential films such as Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors (1964) and The Color of Pomegranates (1969), Sergei Parajanov was a trailblazer in Soviet cinema because his work reflected a deviation from creative normalcy, the guidelines of Socialist realism.
Socialist realism, a theory developed in 1932, idealized the Soviet lifestyle and supported Marxist propaganda in visual arts. Once he abandoned this style, Parajanov’s work began to gain popularity. Defined by its imaginative qualities and facilitated by h
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Speaker: Joseph Bohigian, PhD in Music Composition, Stony Brook University
Date & Time: August 16, 2022 at 8:00-9:30pm Yerevan (09:00-10:30am PDT)
Language: English
The Georgian-born, Soviet-Armenian director Sergei Parajanov was a visionary filmmaker who maintains an outsized importance to 20th century filmmaking, especially in the South Caucasus. His signature symbolical style of biography is best represented by his 1969 film The Color of Pomegranates about the 18th century Armenian ashugh Sayat Nova. Bohigian’s theatrical musical composition I Am He Whose Life and Soul Are Torment tells the story of Parajanov’s life in a similarly abstract manner using Sayat Nova texts in three languages, Armenian, Azeri, and Georgian, representing the transcultural nature of both artists’ output. This evening-length work will be scored for three singers and live electronics, incorporating live processing of the soundtrack to The Color of Pomegranates and recordings of folk musicians across the South Caucasus. The music will be accompanied by projections
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Five years after our comprehensive retrospective of the films of Sergei Parajanov (1924–1990), we are presenting a small selection of the oeuvre of the director, artist, musician and author – this time around with a focus of his seldom-screened last two works and three short films. Born in Tbilisi to Armenian parents, which is where he also grew up, Parajanov is one of the most fascinating figures in 20th century cinema. He first studied singing and choreography in his city of birth and later attended the VGIK film school in Moscow, going on to work in Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia and Azerbaijan during the Soviet era. His films are imbued with the cultures, traditions, folklores and myths of these countries and captivate due to their singular power of expression, unmistakable originality, complex visual compositions and radically free cinematic form. Celebrated internationally as an outstanding filmmaker from the mid-60s onwards, Parajanov’s artistic daring and the cultural diversity expressed by his films was met with hostility in the Soviet Union. Interventions on the part of the c
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