This year the situation was relatively calm in Nagorno Karabakh, the results of parliamentary elections surprised literally no one, no epoch-making demonstrations were staged and no buildings were seized, while the Armenian national football team didn’t qualify for the FIFA World Cup finals… again.

PAN Photo, however, did manage to capture all the developments that will appear in history books years later. For instance, the never-ending cold winter and the frozen Lake Sevan, a renovated street in [earthquake-stricken] Gyumri and people who still face inhuman conditions spending their lives in metal containers, or the massive fire at Nairit plant, the destruction of the actual old Yerevan for launching the “Old Yerevan” project instead, as well as the students who were fighting against a deferment law, albeit to little/no effect. We photographed Avishai Cohen in the backstage just moments before his concert, sought out Marcus Miller minutes after his concert for a shoot at the hotel, and even strolled around the city with Ivan Dorn in the wee hours of the morning. Apart from photographing Viken Arman, we organized the most unexpected and memorable event of the year, the Absolut Moon Stage. We toured the entire country with John Malkovich and the Princess of Jordan and reached the remote areas we were unable to reach with them - from Khor Virap and Yereruyk monasteries to the peaks of Mount Aragats and the mountains of Meghri. But we also went beyond Armenia, capturing the Ethiopian people and the biggest market in Africa, a gorgeous bookstore in Portugal, the hardest-to-reach places in Egypt and India, and the dark and non-touristy spots in Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, France and Germany. Unpredicted as our adventures turned out to be, however, we would never ever imagine that our picture of the Kazakh president would go viral straight away, with people trying to recreate it and even designing custom T-shirts with that exact photo.

P.S. Aside from winning various titles for so many years, Levon Aronian finally got married this year.

PAN Photo:
Vahan Stepanyan, Davit Hakobyan, Sedrak Mkrtchyan, Areg Balayan, Tigran Mehrabyan, Ani Tager, Varo Rafayelyan, Hrant Khachatryan, Artashes Stamboltsyan, Karo Sahakyan, Davit Abrahamyan, Aram Kirakosyan

Contributors:
Artur Harutyunyan, Max Florka, Davit Nersisyan