Slovak Spectator, Slovakia
June 16 2003
by Sasha Petrasova
...The other artist besides Fellini who is honored with a separate section
in the program is the Armenian director Don Askarian. Born in 1949 in
Nagorno Karabakh, in the former Soviet Union, Askarian studied history and
art in Moscow, and worked as an assistant film director and film critic
before being imprisoned in 1975. After emigrating to West Berlin in 1978,
Askarian began his film career in exile.
"Askarian has a different way of thinking. It's a non-European approach,
so his movies are not what we are used to. I don't want to say that his
films reflect his ethnicity or culture, they are just different," says
Vladimir Stric, program director of the Art Film Festival, Slovakia.
"He works with very poignant images, and often covers serious themes.
[Some of his] films are about genocide in Armenia, others are about the
exodus of the Armenian people. Askarian is an example himself, as he left
Armenia for Germany, and his work reflects both cultures."
