Inside the halls of Glendale Central Library, visitors will find more than books and quiet reading areas. Hidden within the library is ReflectSpace — an art gallery dedicated to exploring memory, identity, displacement and social justice through contemporary exhibitions.
The latest exhibition, “Dreams Gather Here,” by artist Rachel Hakimian Emenaker, invites viewers into a world shaped by migration, cultural inheritance and diasporic memory.
Emenaker’s work blends influences from her upbringing in both Suriname and Moscow, Russia, merging traditional craft practices with contemporary art.
“I draw deeply from where I grew up, so I grew up in a country called Suriname, as well as in Moscow, Russia, and so I try to meld the both practices I grew up alongside,” Emenaker said. “Things such as Batik, or what would be considered craft practices in a Western vocabulary with contemporary art.”
The exhibition explores diaspora as a shared emotional and physical space — one where dreams, histories and identities travel across borders and generations.
“I was thinking of this idea for a diasporic architecture where so many people from different places have come with their dreams, with their hopes, and also left their dreams behind to come here for various reasons,” Emenaker said. “I thought about this gathering place and this melding of both dreams for the future to come, dreams that have been left behind, as well as dreams that we’ve inherited.”
According to Ara Oshagan, curator of ReflectSpace, the gallery has served as a platform for socially engaged exhibitions since opening in 2017. Over the years, the space has hosted more than 50 exhibitions focused on issues ranging from diaspora and displacement to civil rights, cultural memory and identity.
Oshagan said he first encountered Emenaker’s work at one of her gallery openings and immediately recognized how strongly it aligned with ReflectSpace’s mission.
“I think the unique thing about Rachel’s work is that she has this idea of diasporic architecture,” Oshagan said. “What do the spaces that diasporic people walk through, and exist in and live in look like? She goes back to the past, the present and looks into the future and creates these landscapes that are here and not here at the same time.”
Several pieces in the exhibition feature iconic Armenian-owned restaurants in Los Angeles, including Zankou Chicken and Falafel Arax. Through these familiar community spaces, the exhibition highlights how food becomes a vessel for preserving identity, memory and cultural continuity within diaspora communities.
“Falafel Arax and Zankou Chicken are both from Lebanon, so there’s this trajectory,” Oshagan explained. “Of course they are from Western Armenia, displaced during the genocide, so restaurants themselves have this history of displacement and movement across generations.”
Oshagan said ReflectSpace intentionally centers exhibitions that reflect the diversity of Glendale and the broader Los Angeles region. Past exhibitions have explored topics including Korean history, slavery, Indigenous rights, LGBTQ experiences, the Holocaust and Japanese internment.
“Over the last nine years, we’ve addressed all these different issues that impact not only our local community, but our region as well as the nation,” Oshagan said.
For Emenaker, Glendale represents a unique convergence of diasporic experiences and cultural histories.
“There have been so many waves, and ongoing waves that have come in here, and each one has brought their unique stories, their own unique culture,” she said. “The Armenian diaspora is so vast, there’s so many different pockets and traditions and ways of seeing and ways of living, and it’s very special to see all of that converge in one area.”
