Richard Gabriele of Langhorne in Bucks County has been awarded a rare honor – a second Fellowship within a four-year period – by the Morris Graves Foundation in Northern California, to begin in mid-July.

Each year the Foundation invites a small number of resident artists, with only one artist in residence at a time. It is a measure of the confidence the Graves Foundation has in Richard’s artistic achievement and promise that this second invitation has been received so soon after the first.

The Morris Graves Foundation forms part of the legacy of the 20th-Century American visionary painter. Before his death in 2001, Graves established these Fellowships to encourage the development of young, like-minded artists.

Richard graduated from the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 2006. His graduate thesis exhibition caught the interest of the trustees of the Foundation. An invitation to the first retreat at the Morris Graves Foundation followed later that same year.

One of his works from this series, “Homage to Graves” was accepted for display both at Art of the State. Pennsylvania 2009 and at the Woodmere Museum’s Contemporary Visions 2010. Another work, Restless Steller’s Jay, won first place in the Lancaster Art Association’s National Juried Exhibition 2009.

The contemporary painter, Charles Stegeman, has written of Richard’s paintings, “What makes Richard’s work important...is that he struggles relentlessly to make each brushstroke expressive of the whole...Richard has proven to be capable of learning from Morris Graves’ vision and artistic goals, which suggests he may be of similar creative capacity.”

Richard hopes this summer to be open once again to the influence of painting in Graves’ own studio, this time perhaps redirecting his attention to the human figure.

In 2009 Richard designed and built a new studio in Buck’s County.  He teaches fine arts and history of art at Bucks County Community College, Salem Community College and Raritan Valley Community College.