Yaghoub Emdadian | "Winter": +2 [Deh Vanak]

2+ [Deh-Vanak], in collaboration with Hoor Art Gallery, presents “Winter,” a solo exhibition by Yaghoub Emdadian.The exhibition opens on, January 1, 2026, and will be on view through January 16, 2026. Continuing Emdadian’s decades-long engagement with the representation of nature, “Winter” focuses on the experience of the landscape in winter. In the “Winter” series, Yaghoub Emdadian returns to nature as both a visual and mental experience. Here, nature is not merely a subject but a vast horizon—one that has continuously inspired new modes of representation over time. This exhibition presents a selection of Emdadian’s watercolor landscapes from 1965 to 1990 alongside a group of abstract acrylic paintings from 2015 to 2026. In these works, snow-covered plains, orchards, and farmlands are transformed into simplified, ordered compositions. Colored squares and rectangles form the core of the visual structure, evoking landscapes rooted in the artist’s lived memory. The watercolors serve as visual documents of nature’s remembered presence, while the abstract acrylics offer a condensed and geometric articulation of that experience. Through a distinctive perspective—raising the horizon line and combining frontal and aerial viewpoints—Emdadian conjures both the feeling of standing before the land and the sensation of flying above it.

White plays a central role across this series: a semi-transparent, layered whiteness that conveys not emptiness but the stillness and cold of winter. Alongside this dominant palette, blue and gray borders and horizons pushed to the upper edge of the frame hint at the distant presence of trees, houses, and traces of human life. Despite the visual quiet and prevailing coldness, subtle moments of warmth and light persist in each painting—a vibrant patch, a glowing line, or a softer plane—suggesting that even in the harshest winters, nature quietly preserves its inner core of life and radiance.

Yaghoub Emdadian (b. 1949, Tabriz) is a distinguished figure in contemporary Iranian painting. He began his artistic path at the Mirak School of Fine Arts in Tabriz and continued his studies at Tehran’s Faculty of Decorative Arts, earning a BA in Painting and later an MA in Graphic Design in the 1970s. After completing his studies, he served for years as an art expert and Deputy Director for Artistic Affairs at the Tehran Museum of Contemporary Art (TMoCA).

Emdadian has held numerous exhibitions worldwide. His recent solo presentations include One Artist, One Artwork at ArtMart Gallery, Tehran (2025), a solo show at Emrooz Gallery, Isfahan (2024), and Hoor Art Gallery, Tehran (2023). His work has also been featured in significant group exhibitions, such as The Influence of Color at the Kunstmuseum Bochum, Germany (2019) and Pioneers of Contemporary Art at E1 Art Gallery, Tehran (2016). His works are held in the collection of TMoCA as well as in international collections, including The Dubai Collection and several private collections outside Iran. In 2005, he founded Hoor Art Gallery in Tehran and, alongside his professional practice, has played an influential role in introducing and nurturing a new generation of painters.