// Wounds That Have Not Healed: Bearing Witness on Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day //
Each year, as twilight descends on April 23, a sea of flickering torches cuts through the night in the heart of Yerevan. Hundreds of Armenians, joined by foreigners and diaspora descendants, gather in solemn unity in Republic Square before marching toward Tsitsernakaberd—the Armenian Genocide Memorial complex that overlooks the Hrazdan River.
The event marks the beginning of Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day, commemorating the systematic extermination of approximately 1.5 million Armenians by the Ottoman Empire between 1915 and 1923. It’s a night of collective memory, defiance, and unyielding calls for justice.
The annual torchlight procession, organized by the Armenian Revolutionary Federation’s Youth Union since 1999, is more than a ritual—it’s a vivid expression of national resilience. For many, the flames represent both remembrance and resistance: a demand for recognition, reparations, and the right to historical truth. They march not only for the dead, but for the future, so their story isn’t erased.
As dawn breaks on April 24, Tsitsernakaberd becomes a pilgrimage site. Tens of thousands ascend its steps to lay flowers at the eternal flame nestled in the center of twelve basalt slabs—each representing one of the Armenian provinces lost to present-day Turkey. The site, constructed in 1967 during Soviet rule, was a rare concession to Armenian memory at a time when open discussion of the genocide was suppressed.
In 1995, a significant expansion was made with the opening of the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute on the grounds—part archive, part reckoning. Since then, world leaders, diplomats, artists, and religious figures have paid their respects here, even as political recognition remains a deeply contested issue.
This year’s commemoration comes amid renewed tensions in the South Caucasus, following Azerbaijan’s military offensive in Nagorno-Karabakh and the forced displacement of over 100,000 ethnic Armenians in late 2023. The echoes of historic trauma have once again found painful parallels in the present.
“Wounds That Have Not Healed” is a photo documentary project that seeks to capture these layers of remembrance—intimate portraits of grief, defiance, and belonging. From candlelit vigils to the faces in the crowd, from elderly survivors’ descendants to the hands placing flowers at the flame, the project offers a visual testament to a nation’s enduring memory.
In a world grappling with denialism and revisionist histories, this body of work reminds us: the past is not past. And for the Armenian people, April 24 is not just a day of mourning, it is a day of truth.
“If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.”
— Desmond Tutu
