The Seeds of the Pomegranate: When Brazil Danced with Armenia
Through four workshops across Brazil, Shakeh Major Tchilingirian presented Armenian dance as a living language of memory, identity and belonging.
By Hélyda Di Oliveira
For 31 days, the thousands of kilometres separating Brazil and Armenia seemed considerably shorter.
After two years of anticipation, British-Armenian performing artist Shakeh Major Tchilingirian travelled across four regions of Brazil—the Central-West, Northeast, Southeast and South—leading workshops that brought together Armenian dance, music, history and ancestral memory.
A London-based dance artist and choreographer, Shakeh is known for her spiritual and expressive interpretations of Armenian folk and sacred dance. Her Brazilian workshops, held under the theme “The Seeds of the Pomegranate—We Are the Voices,” were about more than learning steps. They invited participants to experience dance as a language through which memory is transmitted, identity expressed and belonging created.
Each workshop began with the circle, or gound. No one stands at the front or the back; everyone can see and support one another. Shakeh described the circle as a chalice—a vessel holding and transforming the experiences of those gathered within it.
Participants also encountered the characteristic double bounce of Armenian dance: the feet remain firmly connected to the earth while the body rises. The circle creates a horizontal connection between people, while the body forms a vertical axis between earth and sky. Where these axes meet is the heart—the point at which movement becomes expression and inherited tradition becomes a present experience.
The pomegranate provided the workshops’ central metaphor. An enduring Armenian symbol of life, abundance and resilience, it contains many individual seeds within a single fruit. Each seed is distinct, yet all belong to the same whole.
This image resonated strongly in Brazil, a country of striking regional, cultural and ethnic diversity. There are many Brazils within Brazil, but one region is no more Brazilian than another. Difference does not weaken identity; it helps create it.
The workshops offered a similar insight into Armenian experience. For a people shaped by migration and displacement, identity cannot depend entirely on territory. Faith, language, family, community, music and dance have enabled Armenians to remain connected across generations and continents.
Participants learned dances including Hananer, Aparani Govand and Komitasi Shoror. The Armenian movement vocabulary differed from many Brazilian traditions: the steps were often smaller, the gestures more restrained and—to everyone’s amusement—the hips considerably less active.
Yet Shakeh was not interested in teaching steps alone. Each movement opened a larger cultural story involving village life, ritual, spirituality, landscape, displacement and the ties between generations. Armenia was no longer simply a distant country on a map; it was encountered physically through music, stories and the experience of joining hands.
One dance brought these themes together with particular intensity. Garod, Shakeh’s own choreography, was performed in all four regions. The Armenian word conveys a deep longing for someone, somewhere or something cherished but absent.
The dance begins slowly, as though tracing something half-forgotten but still known. Gestures look back towards those who came before, while arms extend towards the earth in reverence. Finally, grapevine steps weave the individual into the collective, transforming personal longing into shared experience.
Although rooted in Armenian history, Garod spoke to everyone. We all know what it means to miss a person or place, to inherit stories from earlier generations and to search for somewhere to belong. The dance suggested that home need not always be a place we can physically reach; sometimes homecoming happens in the spirit.
The exchange moved in both directions. While Brazilians discovered Armenia through Shakeh, she encountered Brazil’s changing landscapes, accents, foods, rhythms and customs—and received countless warm Brazilian embraces.
By the end of the journey, calling the experience simply “four Armenian dance workshops” seemed inadequate. There had been conversations, questions, laughter, tears, friendships and moments of affectionate silence.
For one month, Brazil became a little more Armenian. We sang Hananer, danced Aparani Govand and Komitasi Shoror, and experienced the longing of Garod. And Shakeh, I am certain, became a little Brazilian.
Like the seeds of a pomegranate, we entered the circle carrying different histories and memories. Through movement, our individual voices became part of something larger without losing their distinctiveness.
After two years of waiting, Brazil and Armenia found common ground—not by becoming more alike, but by recognising something of themselves in one another. Sometimes, all it takes to begin is to stand in a circle, join hands and dance.
Dr. Hélyda Di Oliveira is General Director of Unipaz Goiás in Brazil, a school dedicated to peace education and holistic care. She holds a PhD and a master’s degree in Religious Studies from the Pontifical Catholic University of Goiás and completed postdoctoral research at Ramon Llull University in Barcelona.
