Exhibition Curators, Yerevan:
Vigen Galstyan (NGA), Asya Yaghmuryan

Exhibition Curators, Berlin:
Susanne Weiß, Inka Gressel (ifa)

What can textiles tell us about power, labour, memory, and identity? This is the question at the heart of the exhibition The Event of a Thread. Global Narratives in Textiles. Organised by ifa (Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen) in collaboration with The National Gallery of Armenia, this project looks beyond textiles as decorative or domestic objects and asks harder questions about who makes them, under what conditions, and whose stories they carry.

Bringing together 13 contemporary international artists from ifa's collection in dialogue with 16 artists from Armenia and the diaspora, The Event of a Thread takes its name from an idea by Bauhaus pioneer Anni Albers, who believed that textiles are never passive — they generate new cultural realities and keep old ones alive. After travelling through Dresden, Kuwait, Istanbul, Beersheba, Limassol, Thessaloniki, Tunis, Prishtinë, Skopje, and Novi Sad, the exhibition arrives in Yerevan to weave new connections in this trans-national conversation.

As a historic crossroads of the Silk Road, and a country whose textile culture has been shaped by centuries of craft tradition, Soviet industrialisation, and post-independence upheaval, Armenia is a particularly resonant setting for an exhibition about the gendered politics of textile labour. Working across installation, performance, video, painting and sculpture, the participating artists challenge the idea of textiles as an apolitical, anonymous, or purely feminine domain — and reveal them instead as sites of resistance, knowledge production, and collective memory.

Participating artists: Mariam Aslamazyan, Karen Barseghyan, Ulla von Brandenburg, Karen Michelsen Castañón, Silvina Der-Meguerditchian, Uli Fischer, Ruzanna Frangulyan, Dovlat Garanfilyan, Marcos Grigorian, Noa Eshkol, Andreas Exner, Zille Homma Hamid, Heide Hinrichs, Olaf Holzapfel, Christa Jeitner, David Kochunts, Karine Matsakyan, Valentina Maz, Astghik Melkonyan, Lianna Mkrtchyan, Eva Meyer & Eran Schaerf, Sergei Parajanov, Samvel Saghatelyan, Lusine Talalyan, Tsolak Topchyan, Manan Torosyan, Elisa van Joolen & Vincent Vulsma, Franz, Erhard Walther

The Yerevan edition of the exhibition will be accompanied by a series of public talks and a publication.

The Event of a Thread. Global Narratives in Textiles is a project by ifa – Institut für Auslandsbeziehungen and is presented in cooperation with the National Gallery of Armenia and participation from the Sergei Parajanov Home Museum, the Yeghishe Charents Literature and Arts Museum, Aslamazyan Sisters Gallery, Cinema Foundation of Armenia and Aha Collective.

The exhibition is supported by the Goethe Institut Armenia.