Armine Kalents

{{Short description|Armenian artist (1920–2007)}} {{Infobox artist | honorific_prefix = | name = Armine Kalents | honorific_suffix = | image = | image_size = | alt = | caption = | native_name = | native_name_lang = | birth_name =  | birth_date = {{Birth date|1920|08|18|df=y}} | birth_place = Damascus | baptised =  | death_date = {{Death date and age|2007|11|22|1920|08|18|df=y}} | death_place = Yerevan | resting_place = | resting_place_coordinates =  | nationality = | education = | alma_mater = | known_for = | notable_works = | style = | movement = | spouse = Haroutiun Galentz | partner = | children =Saro Galentz, Armen Kalents | parents = | father = | mother = | relatives = | family = | awards =  | elected = | patrons = | memorials = | website =  | module = }} '''Armine Kalents''', also '''Armine Galents''', née '''Paronyan''' (arm. Արմինե Կալենց, 18 August 1920, Damascus – 22 November 2007, Yerevan) was an Armenian artist, Honored Artist of the USSR (1967).<ref name=":3">{{Cite web|title=Vanadzor Museum of Fine Arts|url=http://www.vanart.org/eng/artists/a-kalents.html|access-date=2020-11-03|website=www.vanart.org}}</ref>

== Life == Armine Paronyan was born on 18 August 1920 in Damascus, Syria.<ref name=":1">{{Cite web|title=Ճանաչենք Մերոնց. Արմինե Կալենց|url=https://www.iammedia.am/hy/post/Armine-Kalenc|access-date=2020-11-03|website=www.iammedia.am}}</ref> Her parents Tigranuhi and Sargis Paronyans were teachers originally from Adapazar, Turkey.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|title=Armine Galentz – GALENTZ MUSEUM|url=http://galentz.am/?page_id=3264|access-date=2020-11-03|website=galentz.am|archive-date=2020-06-03|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200603221255/http://galentz.am/?page_id=3264|url-status=dead}}</ref> The family escaped from the genocide and fled the Ottoman Empire.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web|title=Այսօր հայ մեծանուն նկարչուհի Արմինե Կալենցի ծննդյան օրն է|url=https://armeniatoday.news/%d5%b4%d5%b7%d5%a1%d5%af%d5%b8%d6%82%d5%b5%d5%a9/33814/|access-date=2020-11-03|website=Armenia Today|date=26 March 2019 |language=hy-AM}}</ref> Paronyan’s father died when she was a baby, and her mother had to escape with Armine and her older brother Aram. They lived in Istanbul for six years until they moved to Aleppo, Syria in 1926.<ref name=":0" />

From 1926 to 1935 Paronyan studied at the Haigazian Saint Joseph school in Aleppo, and then at the Jerusalem Church in Jerusalem.<ref name=":4">{{Cite web|title=ORER.eu - Արմինե Կալենցի 100 ամյակը. բացառիկ արվեստագետի հետ զրույցը վերհիշում է Նելլի Մաթեւոսյանը|url=http://orer.eu/hy/allcategories-hy-am/72-hy-am/8039-armine-kalents-100.html|access-date=2020-11-03|website=orer.eu}}</ref> In 1938-1939 Paronyan studied in the studio of a famous painter Haroutiun Kalents.<ref name=":1" /> On 2 May 1943, Paronyan married Haroutiun Kalents in the St. Nishan Church in Beirut.<ref name=":0" />

== Work == In 1939, Paronyan’s first exhibition opened in Aleppo, Syria.<ref name=":2" /> Since 1939, she participated in exhibitions in New York, Aleppo and Beirut.<ref name=":1" /> In 1943 and 1945, Kalents opened individual exhibitions in Beirut.<ref name=":3" />

In 1946, the Kalents family moved to Soviet Armenia.<ref name=":4" /> The same year Kalents became a member of the Union of Artists of Armenia.<ref name=":1" />

In 1947, the first exhibition of the repatriates was organized and Kalents’ works were criticized for “imitation of bourgeois painting”.<ref name=":0" />

Since 1962, Kalents’ solo exhibitions have been organized in Yerevan, Aleppo, Paris, Montreal and Tbilisi.<ref name=":4" />

In 1965 Kalents returned to Syria where her mother and her brother lived, and the next year her exhibition entitled “Travelling in Syria” opened at the Artists’ Union of Armenia.<ref name=":0" />

In 1967, Kalents was awarded the title of Honored Artist of the Soviet Armenian Republic.<ref name=":3" /> The same year, a year after the death of her husband Haroutiun Kalents<ref>{{Cite book|last=Turner|first=Jane|title=The Grove Dictionary of Art|year=1996|isbn=1-884446-00-0|volume=2|location=New York|pages=432|oclc=34409675}}</ref> she opened a hall-studio to exhibit his selected canvases and worked in this studio until the last days of her life.<ref name=":0" />

In 1986, Kalents was awarded the Order of Friendship of Peoples of the USSR.<ref name=":1" />

In 1991, Kalents paid creative visit to the United States.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Kalents Armine (1920-2007)|url=http://www.shedevr.am/eng/artists/?artist=Kalents+Armine&a=49|access-date=2020-11-03|website=www.shedevr.am}}</ref> In 1992, she opened solo exhibition in the Pan-Armenian National Center in Los Angeles.<ref name=":0" /> In 1994-1996 Kalents lived in the United States.<ref name=":1" /> Since 1996, she had been creating again in Yerevan, where her solo exhibitions opened in 2000-2004.<ref name=":4" />

In 1997, Kalents published an autobiography ''Arminé on Haroutiun Kalents; Forgive Me, Haroutiun; Memories''.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Women's Art versus Feminist Art: Categories and Contradictions in Practices of Armenian Art {{!}} Feminism and Gender Democracy|url=http://feminism-boell.org/en/2016/04/19/womens-art-versus-feminist-art-categories-and-contradictions-practices-armenian-art|access-date=2020-11-03|website=Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung|language=en}}</ref> In this book, she draws a realistic portrait of the great Armenian artist of the twentieth century, Haroutiun Kalents, telling the story of their love and difficult family relationships.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Армине Каленц: "Прости меня, Арутюн…"|url=http://nv.am/armine-kalents-prosti-menya-arutyun/|access-date=2020-11-03|website=Новое Время|language=ru}}</ref>

In 2000, a retrospective solo exhibition devoted to Kalents’ 80th anniversary was organized at the Artists’ Union of Armenia. Her last exhibition was organized in the Hall of Albert and Tove Boyajians in State Academy of Fine Arts of Armenia in October 2004.<ref name=":0" />

Armine Kalents died on 22 November 2007 in Yerevan.<ref name=":1" />

== References == {{reflist}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kalents, Armine}} Category:1920 births Category:2007 deaths Category:20th-century Armenian women artists Category:20th-century Armenian artists Category:Recipients of the Order of Friendship of Peoples Category:Artists from Damascus Category:Syrian people of Armenian descent Category:Expatriates in Mandatory Palestine Category:Syrian emigrants to the Soviet Union