This month there will be a special exhibition, titled “Pinajian - The Bellport Years,” that explores the remarkable work of Arthur Pinajian (1914-1999) during his transformative years in Bellport. This intimate showcase offers a rare glimpse into the artist’s creative evolution during this significant period of his career. 

Discovered posthumously, Pinajian’s work has been celebrated for its vibrant expressionism and unique perspective. “The Bellport Years” represents a pivotal chapter in his artistic journey, showcasing never-before-exhibited works that capture his distinctive style and masterful technique. 

Open throughout May, this exhibition invites collectors and art enthusiasts to experience Pinajian’s visionary work in the charming setting of Bellport Village at 139 S. Country Road Bellport, NY 11713. All works are available for acquisition. 

Arthur Pinajain (1914-1999)

Quiet, friendly, maybe a little intense at times, that’s what neighbors thought of Arthur Pinajian (1914-1999), if they thought about him at all. But a genius?

“Ultimately, Pinajian’s work reflects the soul of a flawed yet brilliant artistic genius. When he hits the mark, especially in his abstractions, he can be ranked among the best artists of his era,” wrote William Innes Homer (1929-2012). Considered by many to have been the dean of American art historians, Homer was a Princeton graduate, Harvard Ph.D., and founder and for many years chairman of the art history department at the University of Delaware.

So, if Pinajian was such a talented artist, why haven’t we heard much of him?

“Even though Pinajian was a creative force to be reckoned with, during his lifetime he rarely exhibited or sold his paintings. Instead, he pursued his goals in isolation with the single-minded focus of a Gauguin or Cézanne, refusing to give up in the face of public indifference. In his later years he could be compared to a lone researcher in a laboratory pursuing knowledge for its own sake. His exhaustive diaries and art notes make it clear that he dedicated all of his days to his art,” concludes Homer.

Pinajian’s predilection for keeping a low profile might have stemmed partly from the fact that his family only narrowly escaped the 1915 Armenian genocide that killed 1.5 million children and adults. During the Great Depression, he worked in New York City as an artist for Marvel and Crack comics. Among the characters he created was Madam Fatal, the first cross-dressing superhero. World War II saw Pinajian drafted into the U.S. Army and decorated with the Bronze Star for his valor in the Battle of the Bulge. After WWII, Pinajian joined the Arts Student League and attended their NYC and Woodstock, N.Y., campuses where he focused on abstraction, geometric abstraction, figurative paintings, and drawings. 

In 1973, Pinajian and his sister Armen purchased a cottage in Bellport Village, a quaint bayside community on the South Shore of Long Island, where he continued painting until the final days, in 1999. 

Art critic John Perreault (1937- 2015) was among the first group of scholars and art historians to study Pinajian’s work and personal journals, concluding that Pinajian’s most remarkable works are from the Bellport years. “It was during his time in his tiny Bellport cottage when he was liberated from the deep shadows of the Catskill Mountains and was now basking in the bright sunlight of Long Island’s South Shore. Unlike his Woodstock works, it is in Bellport where Pinajian created expressive and gestural lyrical landscapes composed of soft edges, bright colors and quick brush strokes. They are serious, complex and truly remarkable paintings,” concludes Perreault.

Over the past 15 years, we have examined Pinajian’s collection, going through each painting, and with the guidance of professional curators, art critics, and historians, have culled the rarest and most precious masterpieces from both Pinajian’s early and Bellport years. 

“Kandinsky at his most improvisational,” declared Charles A. Riley II, former editor of Art and Antiques and former director of the Nassau County Museum of Art

“The unlikely discovery that has rocked the art world!” gushed ABC’s “Good Morning America” (March 2013).

“Often, his most engaging works, though visually based on an existing canon, are remarkably original in conception,” from American Art Review (July/August 2010).

The New York Times has run several feature pieces about Pinajian. Dozens of other news outlets around the globe such as the Associated Press, both the Telegraph and Daily Mail of London, wsj.com and Fox News cheered the discovery, settling on a consensus estimate of $30 million retail valuation, a figure that has since tripled.