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Painting of a green field and hills with a large estate in the center. The estate is made from bricks and lit with an afternoon sun, the shadows are long.

Detail: Armine Galents, "Katoghike Church in Talin, Armenia", 1983. Oil on canvas. Norton and Nancy Dodge Collection of Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union.

Dates

September 27, 2025-July 31, 2026

Location

Zimmerli Art Museum

71 Hamilton Street New Brunswick, NJ, 08901

Information

Admission at the Zimmerli is FREE to everyone. Tickets are not required for exhibitions

Topographies of Dissent: Armenian Art from the Dodge Collection

Topographies of Dissent presents a selection of works by Armenian artists from the Norton and Nancy Dodge Collection of Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union, revealing the paradoxes of Armenian history in the Soviet era through the art of its time. Divided into five sections—National Landscape: Land, Identity, Dream; Facets of "Formalism"; Abstraction; The 3rd Floor Group: Pop Art, Hyperrealism, and Neo-Dada; and Dystopias of the Evil Empire, the exhibition reflects the unprecedentedly liberal culture which blurred the boundaries of “official” and “unofficial” art. 

Contrary to its Soviet counterparts, the Armenian art of the Soviet era developed underground organically, building upon the work of the pre-Soviet Armenian artists who synthesized national traditions and independent thinking with the global avant-garde. The Armenian nonconformists were perceived as being aligned with national modernism, until toward the end of the Soviet era, the 3rd Floor movement broke from the restrictions of national and artistic canons.

This exhibition is made possible by the leadership support of the Avenir Foundation Endowment Fund, with additional support from the Dodge Charitable Trust – Nancy Ruyle Dodge, Trustee.

Generous support for bilingual text was provided by Art Bridges Foundation’s Access for All program.

Special thanks to the Armenian General Benevolent Union (AGBU) for their informational sponsorship of this exhibition.

Large letter A with the text next to it reading in full "Avenir Foundation Inc."
Text reading "Art Bridges Foundation" with a purple arch connecting the words.
In modern black text read the letters "A G B U".

 

Exhibition Preview

Ruben Adalyan, From the series “Melancholy,” 1981. Oil on canvas. Norton and Nancy Dodge Collection of Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union.

Hagop Hagopyan, No to the Neutron Bomb!, 1977. Oil on canvas. Norton and Nancy Dodge Collection of Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union. © Estate of Hagop Hagopian 

Gayaneh Khachatryan, Requiem. Bloody Moon, 1975. Oil on canvas. Norton and Nancy Dodge Collection of Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union.

Karine Matsakyan, Half-Hourly Difference, 1985–86. Oil on canvas. Norton and Nancy Dodge Collection of Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union. © Karine Matsakian 

Armine Galents, Katoghike Church in Talin, Armenia, 1983. Oil on canvas. Norton and Nancy Dodge Collection of Nonconformist Art from the Soviet Union.