Vladimir Kurumilian on the Art of Escape
Foreword: Between stillness and movement, memory and release, pianist and composer Vladimir Kurumilian’s Escape unfolds as both confession and contemplation. First written years ago as a quiet refuge from reality, the piece returns now as a raw reflection on coping and transformation, an early pulse in the evolving rhythm of Kurumilian’s upcoming album Mo(ve)ment.
Reimagined through the lens of time and experience, Escape bridges the personal and the collective, tracing the fractures of displacement, loss, and resilience that define life in the region. Its accompanying visualizer, filmed through rippling glasses of water, distorts and refracts Kurumilian’s image much like memory itself. In this conversation, he reflects on returning to sound after years of pause, the symbolism of water, and how movement in all its forms becomes both resistance and release.
All photos are taken by Tarek Moukaddem
You describe Escape as a deeply personal piece, almost meditative. What emotional or creative space were you in when you revisited it?
I had initially started the album with a completely new piece, as a personal response to everything that has unfolded over the past few years; it felt more like an urge, an attempt to avoid feeling completely helpless, a means to share in both the pain and the anger.
Escape started as a place to hide, written back at a moment when I wanted to step out of reality.
Revisiting it years later, I wasn’t trying to run anymore; my perception evolved and I was rather trying to understand that feeling. As the album took shape and its narrative became clearer, including Escape within the storyline became a conscious choice.… It simply made sense. It wasn’t just an old sketch anymore, but a pivotal moment in the story.
The piece feels like it carries both stillness and turbulence — moments of calm interrupted by tension. Was that contrast intentional?
Escape carries calm on the surface, but underneath there’s this obsessive repetition, a loop that won’t let you fully settle and could go on indefinitely if you let it. I chose not only to preserve that duality from the original demo, but to accentuate it through the music production this time. It tricks you into expecting a linear melody, yet the repetition keeps circling back, building tension… It’s like being stuck in the very thought you’re trying to outrun; at least that’s how it feels for me.
How does Escape connect to the broader sound or concept of your upcoming album? Is it a continuation or a departure?
Escape acts as an early articulation of Mo(ve)ment’s themes, embodying the tension between stillness and motion and the album’s sense of a journey in movement, interrupted by shifting moments. Like the full body of work, Escape reflects the album’s exploration of personal transitions within a world marked by instability, displacement, and fracture. My hope is for Mo(ve)ment to offer a space to dwell in the in-between and engage collectively with the inescapable push and pull of reflection and human connection.
Sonically, the looping, meditative qualities of Escape mirror the interplay between piano and electronics (by music producer Ziad Moukarzel) present throughout the album, making it a key moment that both anchors and foreshadows the emotional and structural journey of the full work.
The visualizer adds a striking dimension to the message behind the music. What drew you to this idea, and what does it symbolize in relation to the music?
I wanted to experiment with distortion, how to introduce it without breaking the flow. Water became the element that held everything together, shaping this project both visually and conceptually.
This work deals with displacement, and the warped notion of home. The image of the Syrian young boy found face-down on a beach, drowned while seeking refuge, still haunts me. So does the traumatic Beirut port explosion, the reality of our own war-torn countries and the mass exodus that follows, and most importantly the righteous battle of Palestinians to reclaim their homeland and their fight for liberation. Our world feels distorted and disorienting, and water sits at the center of it all: rivers, shores, open sea. We’re all looking at the horizon, searching for a place we can finally call home.
When I was a child, I drowned in a river during a camping trip. That moment reshaped my relationship with water. Bringing that memory into the album challenged me; it allowed the sound and visuals (captured beautifully by photographer Tarek Moukaddem and graphic designer Nader Tfayli) to echo the feeling of being submerged, overwhelmed, suspended. It became a parallel to how I process the chaos around us today. Water distorts, but it also carries. It became the perfect metaphor.
There’s something intimate and almost vulnerable about appearing in your own visual work. Was that a conscious decision to let listeners see a more personal side of you?
Intimate and vulnerable, but also grounded and relatable. Appearing in the visuals felt necessary because this project isn’t separate from me; it’s an extension of my own experience and my response to what’s happening around us. We’re all living through the same events, but we carry the world differently. By placing myself in the visual language of the album, I wanted to invite listeners in. Each person can have their own experience with the work, while still sharing a moment of collective presence, a conversation.
How do you approach the dialogue between sound and image in your work? Do you visualize the music as you compose, or does that come later in the process?
My process is not linear in any way. For instance, I already had the album title, even the way it was written, long before anything came together. I just didn’t know what to do with it yet.
I am a musician and composer, but I also graduated from art school, so those two worlds naturally overlap. Ideas trigger each other; a sound sparks a visual, a visual sparks a musical direction; and it becomes this mix-and-match process where fragments slowly start to make sense.
If Escape could be seen as a chapter in your artistic journey, what do you think it reveals about where you are now as a composer and performer?
Escape (and this album) comes after a four-year hiatus caused by a series of imposed and self-imposed pauses that led to a necessary time to absorb, reflect, and reimagine. I won’t pretend I was happy being away from music; it affected me deeply. But in hindsight, that distance helped me balance intimacy with critical reflection. It matured my process, it gave me clarity, and taught me how to weave my sound with more intention.
Is there anything else you’d like to share with us we haven’t covered? We would love to know.
I know things feel heavy and uncertain at the moment, and no one can pretend to have the answers or know the way forward… But working on this album, going step by step through the process, became my own personal act of resistance, a way to hold on to a thread of hope. Music is a powerful tool, and I really hope people connect with it in whatever way they need.
Stephani Moukhaiber
Stephani Moukhaiber is the founder and CEO of Al Rawiya, a media company amplifying voices from the Levant and its diaspora. She also leads Al Rawiya Studio, the creative and strategic arm of the company, providing branding, content, and media services to clients. In addition, she serves as the Director of Programs and Operations at the 2048 Foundation, overseeing program strategy, communications, grants management, and operational excellence. Originally, Stephani worked as an organizational development consultant specializing in workplace strategy, including roles at global tech and consulting firms.
- Stephani Moukhaiber
- Stephani Moukhaiber
- Stephani Moukhaiber
- Stephani Moukhaiber
- Stephani Moukhaiber
- Stephani Moukhaiber
- Stephani Moukhaiber
- Stephani Moukhaiber
- Stephani Moukhaiber
