It was more than 40 years ago that I started painting. In 1980 I created my first landscape in oil. I was painting the mountains of Brnakot village, near the city of Sisian. At one moment, the strong wind flipped the painting onto the palette full of oil paints. When I cleaned the paint off the canvas, I noticed an outline of a chapel. Later it turned out that in that area there really were old Khachkars buried under grass and soil. My initial disappointment passed, and I finished the painting, leaving the outline of the non-existent chapel unchanged.

Perhaps this was one of the reasons that I later had the half-ruined, more than three-hundred-year-old chapel in Brnakot rebuilt, which is a significat part of our family history.

I began taking painting more seriously. What started as a hobby became a part of my life. I received professional training at the Moscow Art University. I also took painting lessons in the studio of my uncle, the well-known artist Arkadi Petrosyan.