On Gariné Torossian’s Diasporic Cinema

“On Gariné Torossian’s Diasporic Cinema“

Hyperallergic 2019

This essay was commissioned by Hyperallergic on the occasion of the first Los Angeles retrospective of work by Lebanese-Armenian artist, Gariné Torossian.

From the essay:

A telephone call structures Gariné Torossian’s 1993 film Girl From Moush: a diasporan woman speaks to an operator in a fictive homeland. She asks to be connected to Armenia, but doesn’t specify to whom. Presumably, to anyone in a place which is not this one.

She addresses the operator first in her native language, then in English. “Ur vor etam, yes Hye em … I’d like to be connected to Armenia.” Like telephony, diasporic memory tries to travel impossible distances, to arrive at a place that no longer exists at the time of arrival.

Image: Still from Gariné Torossian, Girl From Moush, 1993.