Exhibition Showcases Artistic Career of Fr. Garabed Kochakian

In 1966, Kochakian enrolled in Iona College in New Rochelle, NY, as a pre-seminary student, earning a bachelor’s degree in Classics. After graduation, he spent the summer of 1970 studying Armenian language and history at Echmiadzin’s Gevorkian Seminary. At the same time, he met his future wife, Detroit native Roberta Carman, who was a participant in the first ACYOA Armenian Studies Program that summer in Yerevan.

As a student at St. Nersess Seminary and the affiliated St. Vladimir’s, from which he earned his M.Div. in 1973, his love of art continued, as he wrote his master’s thesis on “Religious Art in Armenian Theology” under the encouragement of his mentor, Eastern Orthodox theologian John Meyendorff. His dissertation, in which he analyzed the teachings of Vrtanes Kertogh (7th century) and other Armenian church fathers in support of sacred art and against the Byzantine movement of “iconoclasm” (destruction of images), was published in book form by the Eastern Diocese in 1995 as Art in the Armenian Church: Origins and Teaching.

After graduating, Kochakian spent a year studying at the AGBU Melkonian Institute in Cyprus and St. James Armenian Patriarchate in Jerusalem, following which he married and was ordained to the priesthood in 1976. During these travels, he documented and photographed religious art and iconography, continuing his lifelong study of art history. Even while serving as a priest of the Armenian Church, he completed coursework and a dissertation through the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, receiving his M.A. in art history in 1999.

He has been tasked by the Eastern Diocese with writing a number of publications on sacred art (among other subjects) and he holds a seat on the Diocesan Liturgical Arts and Architecture Commission, which advises on the artistic aspects of new church construction. Such works as the bronze doors of St. Vartan Cathedral in Manhattan were designed under his artist’s brush and his approval. He continues to paint as well as to teach young Armenians the tradition of Armenian sacred art from the earliest manuscripts to today. (See his articles on the Instagram page “Armenian Orthodox Theology” https://www.instagram.com/p/DIti_XLKz70/)

The current exhibition, which began on March 13 and was planned to stay up until March 29, has proved so popular that the church has decided to leave it up until April 24, when a large crowd is expected for a Martyrs’ Day commemoration attended by all four Metro Detroit Armenian churches.

The opening was presided over by Eastern Diocese Primate, Bishop Mesrop Parsamyan as well as Archbishop Paren Avedikian of Holy Echmiadzin (former pastor of St. John in Detroit) and the Very Rev. Aren Jebejian, current pastor of St. John. Following a welcome in the St. John Cultural Hall by Dr. Raffi Belian, chairman of the Fine Arts Committee, and short remarks by the presiding clergy and the honoree, Fr. Garabed Kochakian, attendees were treated to a short video documentary on Kochakian’s artistic career, produced and narrated by local composer and arts personality Dan Yessian, a close friend of the artist.