Vladimir Abroyan

Vladimir Onikovich Abroyan was born on 23 September 1939 in Tbilisi, then the capital of the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic. Published sources say little about his family background or his training as an artist; his drawings began appearing in print in 1960, when he was about 21.

Abroyan worked for around forty years with Vozni, the Armenian satirical magazine, eventually becoming its chief artist. From 1960 his cartoons were published in Armenian newspapers including Kommunist and Sovetakan Hayastan, and in many all Union newspapers and magazines, among them Krokodil, Nedelya, Ogonyok, Smena, Sovetsky Soyuz, Moscow News, Literaturnaya Gazeta, Sovetsky Sport and Futbol. His work was also printed in Germany, Romania, Bulgaria, France and Lebanon.

He was a member of the Union of Artists of the USSR and the Union of Artists of Armenia, and took part in exhibitions in Canada, France, England, Brazil, Cuba and the Netherlands, as well as many international cartoon competitions. His autobiography, portrait and seven cartoons were included in the International Encyclopedia of Caricature of the International Centre of Humour in Turin, and his work appeared in the World Anthology of Caricature published in Gabrovo. He received the Cesare Marcorelli prize in 1995, and in 2015 his work The Funeral of the Illusionist was recognised at the International Biennale of Humour in Art in Tolentino, Italy.

Beyond the printed page he worked in animation, on the films The Violin in the Jungle, A Drop of Honey and The Striped Tiger, and was also credited as an actor, presenter and director. In 2022 he was the subject of a Shoghakat television programme about his work. Until the end of his life he drew for the Russian language Armenian newspaper Golos Armenii. On 31 March 2009 President Serzh Sargsyan awarded him the title of Honoured Artist of Armenia for his contribution to satire.

Abroyan had a daughter, Irina Abroyan, who announced his death. Few other details of his private life have been made public. Describing his own temperament with a satirist's dry humour, he once said that he could laugh wholeheartedly perhaps once every five or six years.

Vladimir Abroyan died on 22 October 2026, aged 87. His daughter, Irina Abroyan, announced the death on social media, and it was reported on 23 October by Sputnik Armenia, News.am, Armenia Today, Vesti.am and other outlets. The place and cause of death were not made public in those reports. A memorial service was held on 24 October 2026. Sputnik Armenia offered condolences to his family, colleagues and admirers of his art.

Abroyan's cartoons ran in Armenian and Soviet print for more than six decades, making him one of the most familiar satirical artists of the period. Obituaries described him as one of the most recognised masters of caricature in Armenia, whose name had a place in the International Encyclopedia of Caricature in Italy and the World Anthology of Caricature. He saw international recognition as a way to show the world that Armenia, as he put it, still had good artists.