Ara & Nairi:
My Mother and Her Brother
Oil on canvas, 32 x 48 pouces, 2025
What if you could see your mother before she became your mother?
In this piece, I focus on my mother and her brother when they were children. The image I used as a reference was likely taken by one of their parents. It shows them posing together, smiling. The photo is both fuzzy and full of bright colours, like a memory that has softened over time but still holds emotion.
When I look at my mother in this way, I start to ask questions. What is the truth in an old photo? Who was my mother before she was a mother? It is hard to see your parent as a full person because you always carry the idea of them as your parent. That view can be one-dimensional.
By exploring this photo, I try to see her through someone else’s eyes—maybe the photographer, maybe her brother. I want to imagine who she was in that moment: a joyful child, a sister, a daughter. Painting this is a way to connect with her life before mine and to understand her as more than just “Mom.”
Exhibitions featuring Ara & Nairi:
VAV Gallery, Montreal, Qc, juried exhibition
September 2025
Held in September of 2025, the Summer Residency Show was an exhibition to show the work that the 6 reisdent artists produced during their residencies over the course of the summer of 2025. In two cohorts, a group of 3 artists were given access to the gallery space and facilities to develop reserach-creation projects.
Marie Khediguian's Beneath The Surface Series (Isolation Part I, Part II & Part III).