Mathematician and historian, academician and major Armenianologist Claude-Armen Mutafyan is one of those people, who always do their job with great professionalism and expects the same from his colleagues.
Claude Mutafyan has brought to Yerevan his father’s painter Zareh Mutafyan’s exhibition, which was held in the National Gallery. “When my father visited Armenia in 1971 the style of his pieces was altered, the colors seemed to light and shine. I wished to show his paintings of the past years and dedicated it to 100th anniversary of my father,” says Claude-Armen Mutafyan. During the Armenian year in France Mutafyan had played a significant role. In Marseilles he had organized the “Armenia – magic of writings” exhibition. During his last visit to Armenia Mutafyan told us about the issues of the exhibition held in France, which Armenia is unaware of. He thinks that the RA government wasn’t able to relevantly represent the wealthy culture of Armenia. Back in 1993 Claude Mutafyan initiated the creation of Kilikia period exhibition in Sorbon church. And in 1999 he represented Armenia in the Sixteen Hall of Vatican. In the context of “Rome-Armenia” exhibition the Armenian-Italian links were even more strengthened. He is sure that during this year Armenia-France ties were strengthened not in the state level but just human relations.
– The Armenian year in France didn’t proceed smoothly. There were both beautiful exhibitions and omissions.
– The individual approach was inevitable because there were many events organized. The exhibitions couldn’t be possibly organized on equal level. Let me mentioned that Saryan’s exhibition was terrible, which was held in a remote suburb of Paris – in the Playing Card Museum. I’d like to emphasize that the year of Armenia in France was successful not due to the efforts of state bodies but due to the organizers of the exhibition. French and Armenian committees were established, which were to coordinate everything but a conflict was originated among them. In Armenia Sacra Exhibition of Louver very crucial mistakes were made. The Armenian side was ready to complain about tiny mistakes but was ignoring the major ones. For example, on the map of the 7-8 century it was noted that Azerbaijan was the neighbor of Armenia. It’s worth mentioning that there was no such country Azerbaijan in those centuries. That state was called Aghvank. The posters of the exhibition were prepared by the French but the representatives of Echmiadzin didn’t pay attention to that mistake but complain about the formulation that Armenians were defeated in Avarair Battle. How can you change the history? Armenians were defeated and it’s impossible to hide that. I was in charge of Marseilles exhibition and I know what kind of terrible were being originated, which finally were solved. The exhibition was supposed to be opened in April but the city council hasn’t given its consent till late March. Later issues were created connected with the “National Element”. But the people, who were in charge, were only thinking about their names in the billboards and albums. We have been negotiating for a long time. The Armenian side only cared about those tiny details and they were ready to cancel everything if things didn’t work their way. I promised them that everything is set but they didn’t believe me and they had to keep the paintings at the border as hostage. The arrogance of the Armenian officials really hindered the whole process. They didn’t care about the glory of the country. I didn’t expect such attitude from the Armenian side. There is a famous order in the world. In catalogs usually they put the names of the local organizers but Armenians wanted to be the first ones to make speeches. No one actually cared about the exhibition even the Ambassador. He didn’t even go inside. When I found out a few days before the opening that it may be cancelled I felt like it’s the worst day of my life. I have worked on that exhibition for two years, have involved many people in that. I was in letter-writing with people from London to Warsaw. I received a letter from an official from Armenia, who said he wasn’t going to send the paintings. He sounded like he owned those paintings. So I had to reach till the staff of the Prime Minister so that they would adjust those issues. The only good thing of this story was that I had lost 6 kilos of weight during that period. I needed that.
– Do you think this arrogance is characteristic only to Armenians?
– Not only Armenians. People in general are like that. The French side also has many faults. Everybody was saying here that France is very generous. It did everything for our country. It didn’t do anything. The Armenian side was in charge for transporting the pieces as its expense. These were great amounts of money. Of course, France didn’t have any good interest to represent Armenia. For France there are two types of states. The ones, which are like France and the rest. The only important thing for France in terms of Armenia was that there are many Armenians in France. That’s all. They do care about the votes of the French-Armenians. It seemed that Armenia is France’s little sister. France wouldn’t treat the same way to Italy or Germany. They would pay 150 Eurosper diem to a British scientist, who would bring a cultural piece to France. But they paid maximum 30-50 Euros to Armenian experts. But pay attention that France has never officially announced that the expenses of the exhibition are coming from Armenia. 95% of the expenses of Louver exhibition were made by the Armenian side. France received this exhibition for free and has never announced about it. Many of the French-Armenians were saying, “Look what France has done to us.” They forget that France done anything. The Armenian officials were behaving a very wrong way. Of course cultural relations are necessary but we should understand that both of the sides must behave in the right way. The world has realized that Armenia, which has suffered in the course of its history, has a talented culture, by which it can astonish the world.
– It turns out that everything didn’t go as smooth as they are saying here.
– But we need to speak about that because the employees of Armenian museums cannot speak about that. I am saying this in order the people here start to feel more confident. I perfectly know the environment back in France. But it should be corrected as the people involved in the exhibition suffered a lot. Great successes were the exhibition of Armenian painters in Ruane as well as the exhibition of Gyumri archaeological museum. These exhibitions were very important for Armenia because it symbolized the rebirth of Gyumri, which has suffered in the result of the earthquake. However not enough reaction was caused.
– Why?
– Because the name of the Armenian Ambassador to France was written in very big letters on the invitation. And he ended up not showing up to the exhibition. But the director of the museum worked as a crazy to show the great culture of Gyumri. I am openly saying this because many people in Armenia don’t have any idea about those things. France was being contemptuous to us and Armenian government was arrogant.
– Governments are temporary but culture remains.
– I understand that.
– Recently the environment was pretty tense in Matenadaran, the management of which had signed a contract with the American “Hill” Museum aimed at digitizing manuscripts and had later cancelled it.
– I am glad that this negative contract was cancelled. But the problem is that both the ones, who supported the contract and the ones, who opposed it, had made mistakes. Some Armenianologist have sworn each other in the media so much that it became even shameful. Prior to meeting somebody I was trying to attain information about people in order to know how to behave myself and what to speak with him/her. I think that both of the sides were wrong.
– Which is the best way of digitization?
– Of course, it should be done in Armenia. The cancellation of the contract proceeded in parallel with the election of the new director of Matenadaran. Hrach Tamrazyan was really criticized. But he is a smart man and think that he will do everyhting right. This whole noise disappointed me a lot. Now each of the sides has a list of enemies. The wrong contract is cancelled. Now it’s time for peace.
– Do you see any enlightened spots in Armenia?
– Yes I do but I was really astonished and sad to find out that bookstores are being shut down in Yerevan. Near my house in Yerevan was “Nork” bookstore, which was closed when I visited Yerevan last time. I find this phenomenon very symbolic.
– Can we say that our country is becoming democratic?
– That’s a complicated question. Armenia is neither a religious nor a democratic country. The power of religion is very important because religion is always anti-democratic. If the religion overwhelms in Islamic states those states cannot be democratic. I am an atheist and think that the church is the most out-dated institution and I find the Pope of Rome a criminal.
– What is your viewpoint connected with?
– The church is against contraceptives and finds the use of those as sin. That is sinful because in African countries babies are born like rabbits and babies die because of starvation. Now this is a sin. Many people know that they are not able to feed babies but they conceive babies anyway because the Pope of Rome is against contraceptives.