An exhibition of photos taken by early twentieth century photographer Gurgen (Guros) Paronyan opened in Yerevan on August 30 to coincide with the release of a book writen by ethnographer Argam Yeranosyan that provides important documentary evidence about the social and cultural history of Armenia’s Goris region in 1924-1934 and the 1960s-1970s․

Throughout his photographic career, Guros photographed everything that was disappearing or changing; settlements that were moved from the canyon to the plain during the Soviet years, during which time they were abandoned or demolished, and monuments that were destroyed by earthquakes or human intervention․

Goris-Kapan Highway-1920s

Gurgen Paronyan was born in 1905 in Goris. His father, Gevorg Paronyan, was a photographer who studied in Paris and brought back photographic equipment with him. Paronyan lost his father at the age of one. His mother died the following year. After the death of his parents, young Gurgen was raised by his grandmother and aunt.

In his memoirs, Gurgen Paronyan writes: "My childhood passed in bitterness, and I did not know what the sweetness of a parent was or the taste and smell of a brother and sister. Maybe that's why I still miss my grandmother. She lived until I was sixteen and died at the age of 101.”

Cliff overlooking Goris (1966)

Paronyan began his photographic career at the age of twenty-one, signing his works with the moniker ‘Guros’.

The photo exhibition, at Yerevan’s Union of Photographers Hall, runs until September 6. 180 photographs from the collection of Guros's sketches kept in the archive of the Historical-Cultural Reserve-Museums and Historic Environment Preservation Service are on display. Some are exclusive images that have never been published.