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Gerardo Orakian was born in 1901 in Constantinople. He completed his secondary education at the famous Getronakan Armenian School. He then moved to France, by 1920 he had settled in Rome. He graduated from the Academy of Fine Arts and remained in Rome, where he lived and worked in extreme poverty and isolation until his death in 1963. By being an Italian-Armenian artist, his expressive paintings tell the story of someone who has been deprived of his birth land and suffered the fate of the migrant. His somber colored paintings are mixed with contrasting light; portray the deprived lives of the working people. Orakian’s desire to return to Armenia never happened although a great part of his works found its way into Armenia. His one-man exhibitions in 1947 and 1958 evoked a wide response in the artistic world. His works were saved in part by Armenian artists from other countries. Today, he is considered one of the most original Armenian artists of the 20th century.Orakian died in Rome. His dream never came true, and he never saw his motherland. But his legacy has settled in Armenia forever.
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