kar

kar (Քար) is a new film work that attempts to give visual longevity to Western Armenian ancestral places. It holds both intentional and fortuitous moments of external contributions that exacerbate deterioration of these sites: storms, bird habitation, vandalism, military occupation, earthquakes, grazing livestock, grave robbing, antiquity theft and erasure.

The locations include Ani, Gdouts Island on Lake Van, St. Paroghimeos Monastery, Varak Monastery, St. Tovmas Monastery, Dikranagerd City and Kharpert. All are invaluable to collective Armenian recollection and have been left to decay deliberately and with encouraged destruction by the Turkish government.

The sites are remote, difficult to reach, and in an intense relationship with the perception of time. There is an urgency to preserve them, to share what is taking place, whilst they sit quietly, strongly, smirking and unwavering. The film floats with the unknown timeline of these places and the impossibility of how they might be visually held, and what composition of their existence might be left and consequentially remembered.

The film follows the filmmaker and their father as they move through these locations, ending at Sarkisian's ancestral family home of Kharpert, which they visit for the first time since the Armenian Genocide.

kar has been possible thanks to the Hope Scott Trust, The Gomidas Institute and the Armenian Film Foundation.