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Darius Yektai's "Two Roses."
Darius Yektai is always painting. He wakes up at five in the morning, surfs if the weather is amiable, and then is in his art studio all day. He said a single painting can either take “a minute, a month, or a year,” to create from start to finish.
“Sometimes the idea of a painting sits in my head for a very long time, and then when it's time to make that painting, I make the painting in a day, but it sat in my head and nagged at me for a while,” he said in a recent interview
Yektai’s latest works of art will be on display at Grenning Gallery in Sag Harbor until August, with an opening reception on July 17. This exhibit will be Yektai’s sixth annual showing with the gallery since 2021.
“A show is always an exciting thing,” Yektai said. “There's going to be a nice group of paintings. The gallerists have a great eye.”
The title of the exhibit, “Latest Works,” is not an understatement. Yektai said that the vast majority of the pieces in this exhibit were finished over the last year since his last exhibition, with the exception of one, “After Poussin: Madonna of the Steps,” which he finished in late 2023, but is being shown for the first time this summer.
“What's interesting about that painting is that it sat, finished but unaccepted, until the gallerists came in.” Yektai said. “They loved it, and they wanted to include it. That feeling of it being included in the new work is exciting, because it was just sitting in the corner, questioning itself.”
While Yektai believes he hasn’t fully found his voice yet, he feels he’s certainly close. Yektai’s father, Manoucher Yektai, was also a very accomplished artist, and Yektai said it was hard for him growing up to separate his identity as an artist from his father’s.
“It took me a long time in the shadow of trying not to be like him,” Yektai said. “But when, instead of trying to step out from underneath the shadow, I sat down in the shadow, accepted that I was his son, that I was going to be influenced by him, there was the acceptance.”
“I did develop my own style in that struggle,” he continued. “When it really became authentic and something that is engaging and honest is when I sat down in that shadow, accepted my influence from him, leaned into it and delivered it fresh and new.”
Yektai explained that the inspiration for this particular collection of work is hard to pin down, except for the fact that they are very sculptural.
“I tend to push painting towards sculpture and sculpture towards painting, so the works are textural,” he said. “Most of the subjects are this language I've slowly been developing, and it's just landscape, still life and figuration.”
Yektai added that this series of paintings is complex and engaging, and he enjoyed the “struggle” of making each one come together.
“The works are open to interpretation,” Yektai said. You should look at the paintings, see what you see and respond to them as you know, because there is no right answer in the works. The best paintings for me are a series of little miracles; the ones that start to teach me things when I finish them, open me up to things that I didn’t know.”
Laura Grenning, owner of Grenning Gallery, has known Yektai for over 20 years, and spoke with fervor about the upcoming exhibit.
“What’s great about his work is he just keeps experimenting and pushing the boundaries,” she said. “He’s continued in a series of water lily paintings, but there are also two or three paintings that don't have any resin, just oil paint, which makes for an incredible launch of color and paint. It’s really beautiful abstraction.”
Darius Yektai’s “Latest Works” will be on view at Grenning Gallery, 26 Main Street, Sag Harbor, until Sunday August 3, with an opening reception on Thursday July 17 from 6 to 7:30 p.m. For more information, visit grenninggallery.com.
