Il Figlio del Re di Armenia, preparatory sketch for Rotolo Armeno

Drawing is part of the artists’ family vocabulary. The artists involved as well Gianikian’s father, asking him to translate the Armenian ancient fairy tales. His singsong voice, that alternated Armenian, Kurdish, Turkish, Persian, and Assyrian words, reached the artists on tapes recorded from the mid 1980s, and then more regular mailings from 1988 to 1991. The artists transcribed what the voice narrated into notebooks (11 × 15,5 cm), giving the words a visual character and remained hidden till they showed this 17 meter-long watercolor where the Armenian fairy tales are unraveled.