Edmund Yaghjian

Edmund Yaghjian (1903–1997) was an Armenian-born American visual artist, and educator. He is known for his life drawing, and paintings of city scenes and landscapes. Yaghjian taught at the Art Students League of New York and at the University of South Carolina.

Early life and education Edmund Yaghjian was born in February 16, 1903, in Harpoot, Armenia (now Elazığ, Turkey) to parents Sultan (née Ajootian) and Samuel Yaghjian. By 1907, his family moved to the United States during the Armenian genocide and settled in Providence, Rhode Island where they had a small grocery store. He became interested in making art in childhood. Yaghjian naturalized as a U.S. citizen in 1924.

He received a BFA degree in 1930, from Rhode Island School of Design in Providence; and afterwards he took courses at the Art Students League of New York in New York City, and studied under John Sloan and Stuart Davis.

Career From 1938 to 1942, Yaghjian taught drawing at the Art Students League of New York. From 1966 until 1972, he was an artist-in-residence at USC. Among his students were painter Jasper Johns, and muralist Blue Sky.

Yaghjian's artwork was in three phases, starting with realism, which moved to stylized abstraction, and finally to abstract work.

His art is in museum collections, including at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C..