Mesrop Mashtots

For her biography project at school, Ella chose to research Mesrop Mashtots, the inventor of the Armenian alphabet. She had initially been assigned Ronald Reagan which held zero interest for her, so after some discussion, she and I proposed Mashtots as an alternative and her teacher was more than happy to let her go that route.

The research was done at home and at school, the written portion of the project was completed at school, and the portrait was homework.  The portrait had to use at least three materials symbolizing the person's accomplishments.  So, for Mashtots, we chose a halo to represent his sainthood, a map to represent his travels at a time when traveling was very difficult, pencils to represent that he taught people how to write, some of the letters he invented to represent the new alphabet, and the Armenian flag to represent how he strengthened the Armenian people.

This was a fun project for Ella and me and a great was to celebrate her cultural heritage.  We're pretty proud of our portrait.  Ella plans to give it as a present to her Armenian parents.