Hi Troy,
It is the designed behavior for the selected row to change its background color to the assigned SelectionBackColor (so as the Foreground color with the SelectionForeColor).
To continue to display the images on selection, you could try using a transparent color.
Example:
xg.SelectionForeColor = Color.Transparent
xg.SelectionBackColor = Color.Transparent
Xceed - Software Developer and Technical Support