Estimate the transport price for free

1 lot to be delivered

• Lot n° 143 Ara Tevkantz (1956-2021) "Golden Rain" Oil on canvas Signed lower right: A. Tevkantz; titled by repute 33" H x 41.25" W Provenance: Estate of the artist Other Notes: Ara Tevkantz was a prominent avant-garde artist of Armenian origin. He was one of the pioneers of the avant-garde movement in Armenia in the 1980s, although his artistic genius blossomed in the first decades of the twenty-first century in the US. Tevkantz was born in 1956 in Yerevan into a family of intellectuals, and he received his higher education in visual art at the Yerevan State Academy of Art. His family was a famous dynasty of prominent educators, church leaders, and writers. That fact has undoubtedly left a noticeable imprint on his artistic personality. Tevkantz belonged to the generation of young Armenian artists of the 1970s and 80s who made cultural upheaval in Armenian art possible, which overthrew the official ideological control of the so-called "Social Realism" art movement imposed by the Soviets for more than half a century. As a result of this upheaval, a young generation of talented artists appeared on the scene, creating a new artistic landscape open to diverse movements. Young artists had the freedom to choose their creative path, and Tevkantz was one of them. He was intoxicated by the freedom to create and to experiment, to break boundaries, to express his spiritual and existential philosophy. For him, the basic truth was that every human is the manifestation of the Higher Creator, the Divine Universe. Tevkantz believed that the artist had the responsibility and the mission to freely convey the higher Truth of human eternal unity within the divine Universe. This was the artist’s fundamental existential belief system, operating both in his personal life and his creative work. He wrote in his diary: "My art is the adaptation to and projection of the images of my soul. And it is the only way for the human existence, because the life itself is THE ART." Young and talented, Tevkantz was in search of his own ways of expressing the avant-garde movement to establish himself in this new artistic landscape of Armenia. His call was to express through visual art, the idea of Cosmic Eternal Unity with all that exists in the world, which reveals itself through human Higher Self-Creativity. His manifesto was too radical for some in cultural establishment of Armenia, and his search for means of diverse expression led him to broader explorations of the avant-garde masters of the West. Tevkantz was highly influenced by Joan Miró and Willem de Kooning, and later in his career, he paid tribute to their great legacy and acknowledged them as his teachers. In early 1990s Tevkantz immigrated to the US to have a full creative freedom to express his spiritual quest through his art. In the US, the prolific artist was able to master his artistic genius. He was able to make his innovative ideas attainable. Passionate energy of Enlightened Love energy transmuted into his canvas, attracting an audience willing to share the vital energy of his art and enabling them to be part of the Ultimate Union with Love and Light of the Universe through his artworks. Living in the US, Tevkantz was able to freely experiment and not be rejected. In the US he had full freedoms to express his ideas about the higher mission of art in human existence. He succeeded in mastering his quest to prove that the visual art can be the Way of coming closer with the Eternal Unity Here on earth. Tevkantz participated in several collective and private exhibitions in private galleries including in Miami, Los Angeles, Detroit, and Boston. His works are in private collections throughout the country. Tevkantz passed away in 2021 in Los Angeles. We are grateful to Dr. Mariam Gregory for her contribution of this essay.