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  • Digital Guide: Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich: An Archaeology of Echoes 

Digital Guide: Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich: An Archaeology of Echoes 

Curated by Emily McKibbon

October 16, 2025 – February 15, 2026


We came to transmit the shimmering from which we came; to name it. 

—Etel Adnan, from Surge, 2019 

Installation Images

Healing is an intergenerational undertaking in the paintings of Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich. As a third-generation member of the Armenian diaspora, Ahmarani Jaouich’s work reflects her family’s history of exile following the Armenian Genocide. Traces remain from her family’s journeys from the Ottoman Empire through Egypt and Lebanon, and lastly to Montreal.  

Ahmarani Jaouich’s layered compositions draw inspiration from vintage family photographs, archival images and oral histories. A rich visual language comprised of repeating symbols—such as snakes, eyes, and the fez, symbolizing Ottoman rule—appear across paintings. The artist’s use of rich washes of pure colour reflects her pride in her familial histories, and her desire to use beauty to celebrate their courage and strength. The artist reconstructs a world she could only access through memory and family lore, grappling with grief while celebrating what remains. What we encounter is a deeply personal account of one family’s resilience, inviting us to reflect on our own responsibilities to those who must live in exile. 

 

A note about the Armenian Genocide 

Up to 1.5 million people died during the Armenian Genocide (1915-1923), and countless more were exiled from large swathes of their historic homeland, the Armenian Highlands. The intergenerational experiences of Armenians in exile are complicated by genocide denial, and the community trauma that comes with this erasure. The Armenian Genocide is only recognized by 34 nations. This includes Canada, who recognized the Genocide in 1996.

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A pale blue face with brown hair shown from the side on a bright blue textured background.

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich, Not Looking but Watching, 2025, Oil on canvas

Courtesy of the artist and Patel Brown

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich, Deep Time, 2023, Oil on canvas

Courtesy of the artist

Two white shapes surround an orange space with Egyptian symbols, holding a reclining figure with patterns inside.
A tall female figure arches over smaller figures, showing protection with Egyptian and Armenian design elements.

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich, Anahit, 2022, Oil on canvas

Collection of Michelle Bilodeau and Matthew Kingston

Please note that Anahit will be on view only from November 1 onwards. 

Anahit is the Armenian goddess of fertility, healing, wisdom and water; Anahit is also the name of Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich’s mother. This painting combines Egyptian and Armenian motifs, and shows a central female figure providing cover to a group of smaller figures. Anahit is often shown as a warrior, and here we can see the power that she has in offering protection to those in her care. 

Many of the paintings in this exhibition trace the artist’s family’s exile from Mardin, after the Armenian Genocide. This painting melds Armenian and Egyptian references to show the cultural exchange that came from the artist’s family’s time there. She notes, “Egypt was the land where my family on my mother’s side was able to reconstruct their lives. It became this safe space from which I can rewrite this story.” 

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich, Whisper, 2025, Oil on canvas

Courtesy of the artist and Patel Brown

A yellow scene shows outlines people walking toward a dark arch, surrounded by large stylized eyes.
Rows of soldiers holding rifles stand under a large eye, mixing ideas of watching, loss, and protection.

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich, je vous vois, toujours, 2025, Oil on canvas 

Courtesy of the artist and Patel Brown

Je vous vois, toujours (or I see you, always) shows us a repeating motif of soldier figures, rifles, and an all-seeing eye above and below. For the artist, this painting originally captured the experience of living under an authoritarian regime, under surveillance and the threat of violence.  

In addition to her artistic practice, Ahmarani Jaouich is a meditation practitioner, nurturing an innate sensitivity to discoveries that emerge throughout the painting process. With je vous vois, toujours, Ahmarani Jaouich describes a shift in the work as it progressed: “The soldiers began to take on the form of my father, who had recently passed. His presence emerged quietly, transforming the scene from one of execution into one of protection. What began as a reckoning with violence became a luminous space of care — where grief and memory alchemize into something watchful, ancestral, and enduring.” 

As is often the case in Ahmarani Jaouich’s work, the painting reflects a process of intergenerational healing. We encounter violence, but also the artist’s ability to hold the viewer in a state of watchful care. There is a caring and nurturing presence within the work that speaks to the artist’s desire to honour her family’s resilience. 

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich, In the Earth, in the Sky, 2025, Oil on canvas

Courtesy of the artist and Patel Brown

This painting is a contemporary response to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict (1988-present) between Armenia and Azerbaijan over control of Artsakh, a historical province of Armenia. To date, this military conflict has led to the forced displacement of over 120,000 ethnic Armenians, and widespread international censure over Azerbaijan’s genocidal campaign against the Armenian people.

In 2021, Azerbaijan opened a “park of trophies” showcasing military helmets taken from Armenian prisoners of war and fallen soldiers. This painting captures that scene, although it is infused with Ahmarani Jaouich’s distinctive care. A standing figure is witness to the scene. His eye—rendered as the Eye of Horus—offers healing and protection to those impacted by this most recent instance of anti-Armenian violence. In the lower portion of the image, a contorted body is transforming into a bird, allowing a fallen body the power of flight.

A face with the Eye of Horus looks toward rows of helmets, while a body changes into a bird, showing war and survival.
Blue scene with human and animal figures, snakes, adn symbols in an abstract style.

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich, Exile of Teta Rose, 2022, Oil on canvas

Collection of Scotiabank

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich, Les filles de Teta Rose, 2023, Oil on canvas

Collection of Hydro-Québec

All told, Muriel Ahmarani’s four great-grandparents, and 13 great aunts and uncles were killed in the Armenian Genocide. Their journeys took them from Mardin, an ancient city in what is now Turkey, to Egypt, Lebanon, and finally to Montreal.

These two works show the exile of the artist’s maternal grandmother, Rose (Teta is grandmother in Arabic, reflecting Rose’s life in Egypt and in Lebanon). What unites these works are connections between ancestral figures and mythological beings, and how they represent the transmission of spiritual knowledge and healing across generations. The artist’s engagement with her familial history, and the violence that ruptured their lives over 100 years ago, is always respectful.

Figures in flowing robes raise their arms, linking ancestral memory with myth and exile.
Women with raised arms stand below glowing figures floating upward in a bright sky.

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich, Listening to Shadows, 2025, Oil on canvas,

Courtesy of the artist and Patel Brown

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich, 27, 2025, Oil on canvas

Courtesy of the artist and Patel Brown

In 27, we see a group of schoolgirls, some drawn with bold lines while others are barely sketched in. A fez—a flat topped, conical hat, symbolic of Ottoman authority—surrounds them.  

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich’s maternal grandparents were both orphaned during the Armenian Genocide, when roughly 1,500,000 Armenians were killed by the Ottoman Empire. Ahmarani Jaouich’s grandmother, Rose, was assigned the number 27 at an orphanage in Alexandria, where she was raised after the death of both her parents and her sister. The number 27 has come to symbolize luck for the family—a sign of resilience and survival. Ahmarani Jaouich writes: “In 27, I draw from archival photographs of Ottoman-era orphanages, in which I’ve often searched — in vain — for her face. This work becomes a gesture of reclamation, transforming absence into presence, and grief into light. It is a tribute to her strength, and to the legacy of endurance passed down through generations.” 

A crowd of schoolgirls with faint and bold faces stand together underwatchful outlines.
A pink abstract face with a single blue eye beside a smaller shape with another eye.

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich, future visions, 2023, Oil on canvas

Courtesy of the artist and Patel Brown

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich, In the Quiet of Knowing, 2025, Oil on canvas

Courtesy of the artist and Patel Brown

Side profile of a face in soft pastel tones with a blue eye against a light background.

About the Artist: Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich

Muriel Ahmarani Jaouich is a Canadian artist of Armenian, Egyptian, and Lebanese descent, exploring themes of genealogy, intergenerational trauma, and historical violence through her paintings. Her work is deeply rooted in her family’s history of diaspora, immigration, and genocide, drawing from oral histories, photographic archives, and inherited objects. Ahmarani Jaouich transforms these sources into narratives that blend memory with imagination, resonating with ancestral grief. Her practice advocates for a continual process of listening, believing that addressing ancestral grief liberates present and future generations.  

Currently residing on the unceded indigenous lands of Tiohtià:ke / Montreal, QC, Canada, on Kanien’kehà:ka Peoples territory, she has received recognition through the Lilian Vineberg Scholarship, Merit Scholarship, and Tom Hopkins Memorial Award. Her artworks have been exhibited at Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Patel Brown, CLARK Center, articule, Printemps du MAC and Arsenal New York. Ahmarani Jaouich’s paintings are held in corporate collections, including Hydro-Québec, RBC, Scotiabank, as well as in private collections in New York, Los Angeles, Prague, Barcelona, Milan, Toronto, and Montreal. Ahmarani Jaouich is represented by Patel Brown. 

We would like to acknowledge funding support from the Ontario Arts Council and the Government of Ontario.