InternationalArmenian Genocide, Kennedy assassination intersect in art
Psychiatrist Alen Salerian on why he paints
Published: Friday January 15, 2010
Painting by Alen Salerian.
Alen Salerian (left) and his twin brother N. G. Saleri. Courtesy photo.
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Washington - One might think John F. Kennedy's assassination and the controversy surrounding it are things of the past: dark memories conveniently left in the 20th century.
But this is not the case for Dr. Alen Salerian, who has made it his mission to uncover the untold story behind the president's assassination through art and research.
"Every single [man-made] disaster – every genocide, every holocaust, every war – is preventable, if there is governmental and individual integrity," Dr. Salerian says.
The Washington-based psychiatrist was a 16-year-old boy in Istanbul at the time of the assassination in 1963, and although he did not speak English or understand what was going on, he remembers having cried that day.
"Looking back, I would say, ‘Why would I cry for an American president?' Because he gave me hope. Hope as a minority; as an underdog."
Forty-five years later, on that same date – November 22 – Dr. Salerian opened a third exhibition of his paintings, all inspired by and dedicated to JFK's memory, at the Women's National Democratic Club in Washington.
The predominantly expressionist works are an explosion of colors and imagination, ranging from some based on photographs of Abraham Zapruder, to others dealing with duplicity and the controversy involved, Obama, and even, Mount Ararat.
"Everything is symbolic around Kennedy, because of his openness and his vital messages," Dr. Salerian says. "I don't see myself as a painter. I'm a story-teller. I love to splash colors. This is my way of telling my story."
"Delusions" of Armenian museum in Turkey
The son of a prominent Turkish-Armenian painter, Kristin Saleri, and the grand-nephew of Roupen Sevag – poet and physician, who was among the Armenian intelligentsia massacred by the Ottomans in 1915 – Dr. Salerian comes from an artistic family.
Although in the past he had drawn more than a hundred cartoons, based on his experience as a psychiatrist, he started painting in 2008, and the catalyst for it was a "philosophical depression" brought about by a chain of events.
Having moved to the United States in 1971, Dr. Salerian had a dream to open a museum in Istanbul to tell the story of his family, and through it, the greater story of the Armenian Genocide.
A good friend of Hrant Dink and Orhan Pamuk, he says he felt that the time was right for such an undertaking, as it might have been a "fantastic opportunity for Turkey," especially given its EU-membership bid. He was determined to raise the money entirely from affluent Turkish circles, and had succeeded in getting several large-sum pledges.
"But I was delusional. And Hrant was as delusional as I was." After what he perceived as attempts by the Turkish secret service to undermine his efforts, however, Dr. Salerian says he decided to quit and return to the U.S.
"Six weeks later [in January 2007] Dink was assassinated, and then, three months later my mother died."
The Kennedy conspiracy
"All these things came together by the time when I accidentally went to Dallas, Texas, and walked through the Kennedy museum." The doctor says he found the official account of the assassination hard to believe, calling it a "high-school story."
Dr. Salerian set out on a months-long research, as a result of which he came to believe that a larger conspiracy led to the assassination and remains covered up.
"Assassination is not the right word. This is the first American coup d'état. It's a military takeover." Like many others, Dr. Salerian believes JFK's death came about because he was perceived as soft on spread of Communist ideology to Cuba and Vietnam.
When he became convinced that it was a conspiracy, he lost his bearings.
"I lost confidence in my fellow men and democracy." He says the most worrying fact for him was that something of this nature could take place in the United States.
"I thought these kinds of things happen only to minorities: people can step on you, kill you, move on, and the power structure dictates that." But, he says, Kennedy, a political victim, wanted genuine transparency and progress without the necessity of war, and those were ideas the existing power structure could not tolerate.
"This is a taboo topic. If you push it too much, then you're anti-American, and somehow you have a different agenda. And I've been accused of that [even] by my own relatives and friends."
Art born of agony
That was when Dr. Salerian started painting, to alleviate the personal agony. "Once I've put this into color, then I found some inner balance."
He has also published an article in the Medical Hypotheses journal, in the United Kingdom, and has a book coming up that puts various elements of the Kennedy story together.
"My concerns are intellectual about this. That is, there has not been a scholarly discussion of President Kennedy's death, the politics of it, and there is a paucity of intellectual research."
Dr. Salerian says he also has plans of establishing a Kennedy museum that will encourage further research, as well as celebrate the president's spirit. Fellow Kennedy researchers James Douglass and James Fetzer have agreed to chair the honorary board, and as soon as the latter is finalized he is planning to start a fundraising campaign.
He says he has not approach the Kennedys yet, as he would want to present a ready-made master plan. "I want to be able to say to [them], ‘What can this country do for the Kennedys, besides killing them?'"
Dr. Salerian, who had predicted Obama's victory by painting his election one and a half years before it happened, says he also discovered hope through painting.
