Armenia And The Cinema Of Independence

USC INSTITUTE OF ARMENIAN STUDIES

When, in the early 20^th century, Poet Yeghishe Charents welcomed the frenzied masses and the restless souls, he had in mind the participants in a different moment of explosion, a different uprising, citizens making a different set of demands than those made in 1988 in Yerevan and Stepanakert, and which culminated with the collapse of the USSR in 1991 ”“ and Armenia’s independence. 2016 marks the 25th anniversary of independence.

“TO THE RESTLESS SOULS, HELLO HELLO is the first of a series of events by the USC Institute of Armenian Studies marking 25 years of independence. To begin to mark that event, we are paraphrasing Charents, and welcoming you to an afternoon of films, shot over the last 25 years, all of which try to look at that singular historic event and the years of tentative independence that have followed,”