Principle Gallery sells painting on the cover of the October issue
Russell Gordon’s painting Sod Buster was selected to be on the cover of the October issue of American Art Collector. The painting was featured in a preview of his solo exhibition at Principle Gallery in Alexandria, Virginia. “I live in Alexandria, and I walk by Principle Gallery frequently and…I was strolling down King Street one evening and decided to pop in—it happened to be opening night for the Russell Gordon show,” says the buyer. “I was tickled and taken with the series immediately, and Sod Buster especially caught my eye: the richness and texture, colors and light, Gordon’s craftsmanship, and especially the subject. I see a prairie dog trying mightily (in an alternate reality) to make it as a farmer,” she continues, “but his 1,000-yard stare tells me that it hasn’t been easy (and perhaps has involved conflict with his kin who keep digging up the farm). It reminds me of American Gothic, but with a sense of whimsy. I am delighted by how his left cheek spills over the collar of his work shirt. I obsessed over the painting for three weeks before going back to the gallery to buy it. It now hangs on my living room wall.” 

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A painting by Megan Elizabeth Read sold out of 33 Contemporary after appearing in these pages
Megan Elizabeth Read’s figurative work Study With Drop Cloth 3 appeared in a preview of an online show presented by 33 Contemporary, and curated by Didi Menendez of PoetsArtists. “This painting…was never in a physical show but it was promoted in various channels,” says Menendez. The piece also appeared in a preview of the gallery’s online small works show featuring a variety of miniature-sized artwork, all measuring roughly six inches or less. In Read’s Study with Drop Cloth 3, a woman in a black leotard is depicted mid turn with her back to the viewer. Read creates a blurred effect to indicate that the subject is in motion. “At the most basic level, the tensions, contradictions and complexities of simply existing here-[and]-now often seem too big, too dissonant and too dreamlike for me to grasp,” shares Read. “My attempts to paint them are my way to find an order in things and often lead to these layered portraits of multiple selves—subjective snapshots, reflecting the inside out.” –