Gerard Cafesjian

Gerard Leon Cafesjian (, 26 April 1925 – 15 September 2013) was a businessman and philanthropist who founded the Cafesjian Family Foundation (CFF), the Cafesjian Museum Foundation (CMF) and the Cafesjian Center for the Arts.

Early years, military service and professional career Cafesjian was born on April 26, 1925, in the Bensonhurst neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York. His parents had immigrated to the United States preceding the Armenian genocide by the Turks. for Como Park in St. Paul, Minnesota, and founded the Scottsdale Museum of Contemporary Art in Arizona. He also donated to the Armenia Fund USA, the Armenian Assembly of America, the Armenian General Benevolent Union, the Armenian National Committee of America, and others. He was also the owner of The Armenian Reporter, the oldest independent Armenian American publication.

Cafesjian received accolades and recognition from both the U.S. and Armenia institutions, including the Ellis Island Medal of Honor in 2000 and COAF Save a Generation Award in 2010.

Cafesjian Center for the Arts in Yerevan 2025 Armenian sheet of stamp showing a photograph of Cafesjian, a section of the Cascade complex, and some of the sculptures in the Cafesjian Sculpture Garden.

Cafesjian completely renovated the Cascade site in downtown Yerevan, Armenia. As of the early 2000s, it was an unfinished and crumbling Soviet structure of epic proportions on a hillside. Following a major reconstruction, the Cascade became the site of the Cafesjian Center for the Arts that opened in 2009. The museum has a sculpture garden with works by Fernando Botero, Lynn Chadwick, Barry Flanagan, François-Xavier Lalanne and Jaume Plensa, among others. Over one million people have visited the Center since its opening.

Armenian Genocide Museum and Memorial in Washington From 2000 to 2003, Cafesjian assembled a group of properties in Washington, D.C., two blocks from the White House, with the intention to build an Armenian Genocide Museum and Memorial. But due to continuing litigation, the project remains unrealized. Although Cafesjian won the basic lawsuit in January 2011 and was awarded the property, and subsequent motions for new trial were dismissed, the project is still in limbo awaiting the Court to rule on yet another appeal.

Personal life Gerard Cafesjian married Cleo Thomas, a nurse he met during World War II, on July 4, 1947, and together they had three children. Gerard's eldest son, Tommy Cafesjian, was a real estate magnate based out of Philadelphia.

Gerard Cafesjian died on September 15, 2013, at the age of 88. His wife Cleo Cafesjian had died just a few months earlier, on March 7, 2013.