Dear Reader,

This issue is about art being made outside of Los Angeles and New York. If art is being made and shown at reputable galleries in those cities, it has the stamp of approval: Collectors can feel safe that their taste is superb and their investments are secure, and even more importantly, they can always flip the art and make loads of money.

I had a different approach to my editor’s letter before a PR email arrived from David Kordansky Gallery, a prominent LA gallery that recently added a space in New York. It’s one that I admire (even though they don’t advertise), with many good artists on their roster. The artist they were promoting at the Frieze New York art fair was Mai-Thu Perret. The image included was of a very large ceramic flower with a phallic emphasis. It caught my eye, not only because it was a gorgeous piece to behold, but because it also bore a distinct resemblance to a ceramic piece featured in this issue by Kansas City-based ceramic artist Linda Lighton (see page 37 and whose work also graces our cover). There’s certainly nothing wrong or unflattering about that.

Sometimes I will see a notable artist’s work here in LA, and it will remind me of another artist that works in the hinterlands. I will forward the image, telling them that they must be doing something right. This is the very reason I chose to expose what artists are doing outside of the major metropolitan art centers for our Beyond LA issue—because for purely geographical reasons their work often doesn’t receive the exposure it deserves. 

When a friend and colleague, writer Frances Colpitt, reached out to ask me if I’d be interested in her writing about a Texan artist whose early career she’d been following, I was game, because anything Frances writes is gold to me. But then I got to thinking, why not do a whole issue on artists that work outside the big cities: We’re all thinking globally now, why can’t that include middle America?

Is the art being made in cosmopolitan centers better because it’s being represented by high-end galleries? We live in a hypercapitalist society where the rich just get richer and the poor stay poor. It’s quite simple really: rich people need things to buy with all their money. 

So I wanted to take this opportunity to expose some hard-working artists living in all parts of the US. We’ve got artists from Fort Worth, Chicago, Kansas City, Richmond, Virginia and Lincoln, Nebraska. I was knocked out by all of them. Of course their art is just as valid as Mai-Thu Perret’s. It’s just not being shown at David Kordansky Gallery.