Occidental’s Media Arts & Culture (MAC) department welcomed this year’s Artist-in-Residence, filmmaker Anahid Yahjian ‘11, Sept. 8-11. The residency included three events: a film screening and Q&A session Sept. 8, a screening of a compilation of films curated by Yahjian Sept. 10, and a socratic-style film workshop for Occidental students Sept. 11.
Yahjian said she is the first Occidental alumna to be a MAC Artist-in-Residence, something she was particularly excited about.
“It’s such a treat to share my work, but also to answer questions from students, because I see a version of myself in them,” Yahjian said. “Passing along the knowledge that I’ve gained out in the field, but also to come full circle to a place where I learned so much.”
Yahjian said she was born in Bulgaria, but grew up in LA and has Armenian ancestry. According to Yahjian, her varied identity drives much of her creative process.
“There’s a hybridity to who I am that shows up in a lot of my work, whether I’m making something personal, or I’m making something about somebody else,” Yahjian said. “I tend to be drawn to questions and themes around a hybrid sense of self. Complexity is something I value immensely and I embrace, I learned that at Oxy.”
Yahjian said some of the most important lessons of filmmaking she learned at Occidental were related to self-expression and storytelling.
“[Filmmaking] is not about being technically proficient,” Yahjian said. “It’s first and foremost about knowing how to tell a story. You don’t need any equipment for that.”
According to Yahjian, her vision for filmmaking revolves around finding personal truth within her complex background and experiences, especially surrounding her Armenian identity.
“I’m not interested in making propaganda,” Yahjian said. “I’m not interested in preaching; I’m interested in sharing complexity and sitting with that discomfort, with an audience, without telling them what to think or who to be.”
Yahjian said her films stretch across different styles, from artist documentaries for Amazon Music to short films about queer hackers living under a tyrannical government.
“I work in many different genres and formats,” Yahjian said. “I’m not exclusive to documentary or fiction or experimental work. Even when I’m working in one mode, there tend to be pieces of the other modes blended in.”
Yahjian said this hybridity is a key pillar of her work. At the film screening Sept. 8, Yahjian had the audience read aloud from posters where she had written similar guiding principles.
“[The posters said] ‘constraints begets creativity’, ‘creativity begets magic’, ‘rest is radical’ and ‘the personal is political’.” Yahjian said via email.
James Irvine Professor of Media Arts & Culture Broderick Fox, curator of the residency, said he taught Yahjian during her time at Occidental. Fox said her previous return visits to Occidental partially inspired her residency.
“I had Anahid come as a guest to one of my classes last year, an introductory MAC 240 ‘Intermediate Practices class’,” Fox said. “As a department, we think a year ahead to identify a visiting artist.”
According to Fox, his friendship with Yahjian made the process of planning the residency enjoyable and particularly special.
“Given my long-standing relationship with Anahid, as a professor and mentor and now as a colleague and friend, it was a gift for me to get that opportunity to work with her in organizing her return here,” Fox said.
According to Fox, MAC Department Chair Dr. Katarzyna Marciniak was intrigued by the fluid and exploratory nature of Yahjian’s work, and supported her selection as Artist-in-Residence.
“For me, as an immigrant scholar who is always interested in uplifting immigrant and diasporic artists and their creativity, I am especially thrilled that we could bring Anahid to Oxy,” Marciniak said via email. “Our first Artist-in-Residence was Tania El Khoury […] and then Guillermo Gómez-Peña […] MAC is continuing the tradition of spotlighting diasporic art.”
Fox said Yahjian’s work had a meaningful and significant impact in its display during the residency.
“It really was neat to have the work speak for itself and be the attractor,” Fox said. “To have the resonance of being an alum and her ability to speak from an informed place about the journey here, and also beyond, is just the icing on the cake, in addition to her own sort of real excellence as an artist.”
According to Marciniak, Yahjian’s residency had a wider resonance within sociopolitical themes.
“Our hope is that this kind of work resonates with Occidental students interested in the politics of borders, rights, justice, and complex issues of belonging,” said Marciniak via email.
Contact Chloé Guerrand at guerrand@oxy.edu
