Sideshow Gallery

Sideshow Gallery is an art gallery in Williamsburg founded by painter Richard Timperio in 1979. The gallery operates on the principle that artistic integrity is the only criterion for exhibition, showcasing work regardless of style or market position through salon-style shows.

Sideshow Gallery has always operated on a single conviction: that visual art, like music, is a language. And any work that earns its integrity deserves a wall. Founded by painter Richard Timperio, who moved to Williamsburg in 1979 and started hanging shows at Planet Thailand before he had a building, the gallery grew out of a belief that the art itself is the only criterion that matters: not style, not market position, not age. The annual Sideshow Nation salon became its most visible expression of that: hundreds of artists, floor-to-ceiling, no hierarchy of notoriety, every inch of wall filled. The gallery has shown early work by Chris Martin, Thornton Willis, and Larry Poons alongside unknowns. What Sideshow kept returning to (and what it still asks) is whether a space can hold all of that at once without ranking any of it.