Yerevan Sights

  1. Artists' Union

    The Artists' Union is a major exhibition space.

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  2. Blue Mosque

    Of the eight or so working mosques in Yerevan in 1900, the Blue Mosque is the only one remaining. The Iran Information & Communication Centre next door has the key. It's appropriate to wear trousers and a long-sleeved shirt - no bare legs or shoulders. The Soviets turned the mosque into the Yerevan City Museum until it was restored and somewhat 'modernised' by an Iranian religious/government foundation in the 1990s. It lives on as a sign of Armenia's necessarily good relations with Iran.

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  3. Cascade

    A vast flight of stone steps and flower beds, the Cascade leads up to a monument commemorating the 50th anniversary of Soviet Armenia. It completes one end of Tumanyan's north-south axis through the city, in line with Tigran Mets Poghota and the Hyusisayin Poghota (Northern Avenue) project. There are five recessed fountains along the Cascade, some with sculpted panels and postmodern khatchkars .

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  4. Erebuni Fortress

    Excavations began at the Erebuni Fortress site in 1959 after a farmer found a stone tablet with writing on it in the dirt. Follow Tigran Mets Poghota south past the train station and turn left onto Erebuni Poghots; the site and museum are at the end of the road.

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  5. Erebuni Museum

    The Erebuni Museum , at the bottom of the hill, has cuneiform tablets and jewellery excavated from the site in a striking 1960s Soviet building with huge apricot-coloured tufa friezes.

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  7. Haghtanak Park

    Haghtanak Park is a mostly overgrown patch of woods. Watch out for children (and sometimes adults) speeding around in miniatures cars. There's a quaint amusement park in the park with a Ferris wheel, cafés and outdoor billiards tables.

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  8. Hanrapetutyan Hraparak

    The former Lenin square, Hanrapetutyan Hraparak is surrounded by the city's finest ensemble of buildings, particularly the Armenia Marriott Hotel and the National Art Gallery and State Museum of Armenian History, where Stalinist scale meets Armenian architecture in a huge yellow-and-cream building facing some massive fountains. The statue of Lenin now lies on its back in the museum's courtyard while the head is apparently stored in the basement.

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  9. Katoghike

    The tiny Katoghike is at the corner of Sayat-Nova Poghota and Abovyan Poghots. The Soviets were demolishing a later church here in 1936, which exposed the fine inscriptions on the chapel. Amazingly enough for that era, a public outcry let the chapel survive. Fragments from the dismantled church lie around it.

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  10. Martiros Sarian Museum

    This museum preserves the studio and some of the works of 20th-century painter Martiros Sarian. Some say the pick of his works adorn galleries in Moscow and Paris. Start your visit to the Martiros Sarian Museum upstairs with his sombre early works, then watch the colours erupt as he falls in love with Persia and Egypt. His art seems to mature by fusing those colours into a vision of an Oriental Armenia, landscapes of stark mountains, green villages and plunging gorges.

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  11. Matenadaran

    Armenia's ancient manuscripts library, the Matenadaran, stands like a cathedral at the top of Yerevan's grandest avenue. It preserves more than 17,000 Armenian manuscripts and 100,000 medieval and modern documents.

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  13. Military Museum

    Inside the 50m pedestal of the Mother Armenia statue is a Military Museum. The interior is based on Surp Hripsime at Echmiadzin, a brave acknowledgment of religion by the architect during Stalin's lifetime. Originally fitted out with displays from WWII (300,000 Armenians died, half of those sent to fight), today most of the space is devoted to the Karabakh War - a Dashnak's paradise which includes a tableau of female soldiers in the Karabakh conflict.

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  14. Mother Armenia

    Symbolism abounds in the huge statue of Mother Armenia. She looms over the city in line with Mesrop Mashtots Poghota, on a classic Soviet plaza complete with tanks and jets set on pedestals at the eastern end of Haghtanak (Victory) Park. The 23m-high Mother Armenia glares out across the city towards the Turkish border with a massive sword held defensively in front of her. She replaced a Stalin statue in 1967.

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  15. Museum of Modern Art

    Near the corner of Sarian Poghots is the main exhibition centre for contemporary Armenian artists, the Museum of Modern Art. It also has an impressive collection of works from the 1970s onwards. The museum is on a narrow lane just off Mashtots.

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  16. Museum of Russian Art

    A collection of 200 works by 19th- and 20th-century Russian artists, donated by Professor Aram Abrahamian, who had a taste for cheerfully picturesque landscapes.

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  17. Museum of the Armenian Genocide

    Commemorating the agony of the 1915-22 genocide of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire and Turkish republican forces, the Museum of the Armenian Genocide and memorial creates a moving experience. The museum lies underground in a grey stone hall. Large photographs (many, but not all, with English explanations) tell the story of the genocide simply and baldly. There's no effort to demonise the Turkish people; the facts are allowed to speak for themselves.

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  19. Museum of the Middle East

    A small but diverse collection of artefacts from Zoroastrian Persia and early regional civilisations from Luristan and Elam. It's at the back of the National Art Gallery, and affords a peek at Lenin's headless statue in a courtyard.

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  20. National Art Gallery

    Holding the third biggest collection of European masters in the former USSR, many of the works in the National Art Gallery were appropriated in Europe during WWII. This national treasure includes works by Donatello, Tintoretto, Fragonard, Courbet, Theodore Rousseau, Rodin, Rubens and Jan Van Dyck. There are also many works by Russian painters, and Armenian painters, sculptors and graphic artists including Martiros Sarian, Yervand Kochar and Sedrak Arakelyan.

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  21. National Folk Art Museum of Armenia

    Has a large display of Armenia's finest crafts, which reveal the exotic influence of the East in Armenian culture. There's also a nice lace exhibit and some interesting woodcarving.

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  22. Norarar Pordzarakan Arvesti Kentovon

    The Norarar Pordzarakan Arvesti Kentovon is a large, well-appointed gallery and art complex facing the big Vernissage market. Yervand Kochar's 1959 figure Melancholy pines at the entrance. Most of the artists in residence are in their 20s, and avant-garde concerts and performances are held in a huge auditorium. Viewed with healthy suspicion by the more conservative arts audience, the next Armenian cultural revolution might start here.

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  23. Opera House

    The landmark of the northern part of the city, the Opera House is surrounded by parks, cafés, nightclubs and shops. The building has two main halls: the Aram Khachaturian Concert Hall and the National Academic Opera and Ballet Theatre, thoroughly upgraded in 2003. Tastes have broadened a bit since Soviet Armenia, and the music scene here goes beyond opera and symphonies to Russian pop, MTV and a night club in the bowels of the Opera House itself.

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  25. Sergei Paradjanov Museum

    This engaging, eccentric house museum of an avant-garde film director and artist stands by the Hrazdan Gorge near Surp Sargis. Paradjanov was born in 1924 in Tbilisi, but retired to Yerevan after serving prison terms on charges of immorality in the 1970s and 1980s. While some of his international admirers campaigned for his release (with mixed results), his health was affected and he died in 1990.

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  26. State Museum of Armenian History

    This museum spans from Stone-Age cave dwellers in the Hrazdan Gorge to the astronomy and metallurgy of 3000 BC Metsamor, the Urartu Empire and the gathering of the Hayk tribes into a nation in the 6th century BC. After that centuries fly past at the State Museum of Armenian History; through Hellenic Armenia, the arrival of Christianity and long wars against Persia, the Arab conquest and subsequent flowering at Ani, and then the long centuries under Muslim Turkish and Persian rule.

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  27. State Museum of Wood-Carving

    Actually an interesting collection of some meticulous pieces, both modern and medieval.

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  28. Surp Grigor Lusavorich Cathedral

    Modern Yerevan's first real cathedral was built to celebrate 1700 years of Christianity in Armenia and was consecrated in 2001. This hulking building stands on a small hill where Khandjian Poghots meets Tigran Mets Poghota. It's a bit brutalist in execution, possibly because it hasn't been around for 1000 years and collected age, atmosphere and khatchkars . Stairs leading up from Tigran Mets Poghota point straight at the carbuncle of the Kino Rossiya building across the street.

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  29. Surp Sargis Church

    The Surp Sargis church is on Israeliyan Poghots just off Mashtots, overlooking the Hrazdan. The Sunday liturgy and choir is particularly good.

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