Town officials and community members in Watertown, Massachusetts, USA came together recently to celebrate the opening of a new gallery at the Armenian Museum of America, Watertown Wicked Local reported.

The gallery, “Armenia: art, culture, eternity,” showcases nearly 3,000 years of Armenian history, from ancient Urartu to present-day.

More than 50 objects are on display, everything from a 20th-century pair of a child’s leather shoes, to an 18th-century Kütahya vessel. The museum’s new executive director Jennifer Liston Munson is the mastermind behind this project. This is her first gallery opening as executive director.

Munson said she wanted to highlight objects in small vignettes to describe a variety of topics important to Armenian culture such as the early adoption of Christianity, the invention of a unique Indo-European alphabet and language, traditions in textiles, metalwork and Kütahya ceramics, the tragedy of the genocide, and how Armenians made their way to the United States to become part of the fabric of American life.

Part of the gallery includes a rotating display of donated items highlighting individual Armenian family histories, in particular of those whom fled the genocide and immigrated to the United States.

One of the objects in this display is an orphan’s dress from 1915. The short-sleeved dress is white cotton with bright, blue embroidery around the sleeves, collar and hem. Araxie Krikorian wore this dress during her time at a Greek orphanage in the Greek island of Syros. After Krikorian’s parents were killed in the genocide, she was separated from her two sisters and brought to the orphanage. Throughout all of this time, Krikorian kept the dress she wore in Greece as a token of remembrance.

“Armenia: art, culture, eternity” will be a permanent installation in the museum.

Future gallery renovations will include expanded galleries that explore the narrative of the genocide.