LOS ANGELES – The Los Angeles Public Library will open the exhibition Ara Oshagan: How the Future May Hold in Central Library’s Annenberg Gallery on Saturday, October 18, 2025. The exhibition entangles past, present and future while imagining a tomorrow when the idea of a displaced people returning to indigenous lands is both a dream and a possibility. The bilingual (English and Armenian) exhibition will run through January 11, 2026 in the Annenberg Gallery at Central Library, 630 W. Fifth St. in downtown Los Angeles.
The multi-dimensional and layered exhibition begins with photographic work that reflects Oshagan’s own sense of displaced diasporic identity through the community life and spaces of the Armenian community in Los Angeles. In a new series, Oshagan further considers his diasporic journeys and the right of return by sourcing medieval Armenian talismanic scrolls and adding photographic elements.
A large-scale display of portraits and testimonies of communities recently forcibly displaced from their homeland of Nagorno Karabagh/Artsakh continues the theme of diaspora, focusing on this community that became diasporic overnight.
Return is also at the core of another new series of works where Oshagan considers what might happen if the displaced Armenian community of Nagorno Karabagh/Artsakh returns to their indigenous homeland in the year 2125. One hundred years after their exile, the great-grand-children of Artsakh’s displaced communities are able to see their rugged native land for the first time. Oshagan asks: “What is their connection to the land of their ancestors exiled in 2023?”
“With our newest exhibition, Ara Oshagan: How the Future May Hold, Los Angeles Public Library will once again shine a spotlight on one of our city’s diverse
