Three artists who were previously featured in The Artsy Vanguard have experienced remarkable career breakthroughs in 2025, demonstrating the program's ability to identify emerging talent. The eighth edition of The Artsy Vanguard launched earlier this month, showcasing 10 of today's most promising artists. Since its debut in 2018, the program has consistently highlighted exceptional creative talent, with many alumni becoming leaders in contemporary art and culture.
Sasha Gordon, who was featured in The Artsy Vanguard 2022, has emerged as one of the most talked-about young artists of her generation. Born in 1998 in Somers, New York, Gordon creates electric-colored, hyperrealistic paintings that explore identity through self-portraiture. When first introduced to the Vanguard, writer Claire Voon described her work as "weird," noting how Gordon's paintings "embrace the uncanny through self-portraiture only to assert the very real feeling of navigating layered selves." Her work explores her experience as a biracial queer woman, using color, scale, and doubling techniques to define herself while pushing against real-world limitations.
Gordon's "weirdness" has resonated powerfully in recent years, establishing her as a leading voice among young figurative painters who use portraiture to examine identity politics and the body. In 2023, she had her first solo museum exhibition, "Sasha Gordon: Surrogate Self," at the ICA Miami, strategically timed to coincide with the city's major December art world events. Less than a year later, at age 26, Gordon became the youngest artist to join the prestigious David Zwirner gallery roster, where she is co-represented alongside Matthew Brown.
The intense collector demand for Gordon's work became evident through her impressive auction debut. Her painting "Gone Fishing" (2019) sold for $214,200 at Christie's New York, achieving 114 percent above its mid-estimate. Her first solo exhibition with Zwirner, titled "Haze," opened in New York at the end of September and became one of the fall season's most buzzed-about shows. New York Magazine critic Jerry Saltz was particularly impressed, writing, "When she hits, she hits hard. She paints to free herself from fetishization and the suffocating standards of beauty."
Michaela Yearwood-Dan, another alumna from The Artsy Vanguard 2022, has achieved extraordinary success with her distinctive abstract paintings. Born in London in 1994, the British painter was initially recognized for her "unabashedly lush and tactile works" that manifest themes of love, vulnerability, and femininity, as writer Allysia Alleyne described in her original profile. Over the past three years, Yearwood-Dan's calligraphic abstractions filled with floral motifs and diary-like text have become wildly popular, positioning her among the most prominent abstract painters of her generation.
Yearwood-Dan's auction performance has been consistently impressive, with works commanding premium prices. A month before her Vanguard feature, her painting "Coping Mechanisms" (2021) sold at Phillips London for £239,400 ($270,600), nearly 12 times more than its lower estimate and setting a record for the artist. Just six months later, that record was shattered when "Love me nots" (2021) sold for a staggering £730,800 ($881,519) at Christie's London.
In September 2024, Yearwood-Dan joined the prestigious Hauser & Wirth gallery roster, where she is represented in collaboration with Marianne Boesky Gallery. She completed a residency at Hauser & Wirth's Somerset, England studio that fall, and in May 2025, she mounted her first solo exhibition with the mega-gallery, "No Time For Despair," in London. Speaking to The Artsy Podcast in July, she reflected on her rapid rise: "I feel very fortunate that the equation of hard work and success has worked in my favor." Her momentum continues with a major institutional solo exhibition scheduled at The Whitworth in Manchester, England, in April 2026, which will feature a new commission.
Xin Liu, the most recent addition to this successful trio, was featured in The Artsy Vanguard 2025. Born in Xinjiang, China in 1991 and currently based in London, Liu creates ambitious cross-disciplinary work spanning painting, installation, video, and sculpture. As Artsy editor Josie Thaddeus-Johns noted in her profile, Liu's work "often considers the body and identity through the lens of technology" and involves "experiments with technologies from space travel to DNA sequencing." Thaddeus-Johns emphasized that "for Liu, the scientific experiments in her artworks aren't a way to distance herself from Earth and humanity, but rather to come closer to others."
Liu has experienced several standout moments since her Vanguard inclusion. In February, she was featured in a solo booth at Frieze Los Angeles with local gallery Make Room. The presentation, which drew curious crowds during the fair's VIP day, centered on a triptych featuring a bronze cast of her mouth. Her success continued into the fall season when she received a prestigious Henry Moore Foundation Artist Award in September, which recognizes sculptors in the United Kingdom.
Last month, Liu presented another highly discussed solo booth at Frieze London with Public Gallery. The installation was anchored by "Insomnia" (2025), a water tank where organic duckweed, wax, and threads coexist uneasily with synthetic LEDs and silicone in a laboratory-like environment. The mesmerizing work became a popular fixture on social media throughout the fair. Market interest in Liu's work has also surged significantly, with inquiries on Artsy increasing by 325 percent year-over-year since her Vanguard feature, demonstrating the growing collector demand for her innovative interdisciplinary approach.
