An interview with the 2019 Holy Family ATX Artist Collective.

What is your favorite art space in Houston?

The Cy Twombly Gallery at the Menil helps me process my emotions. I love how each room is energetically contained. When I walk through the space, it's like revisiting someone's own person visual journal. I keep a journal myself, so this space helps me access my own stream of consciousness when I am feeling overwhelmed, nostalgic, of or uninspired. Afterwards, I like to lay in the grass to recharge.

Who are some of the artists, creatives and/or teachers who have influenced your art?

Dance Company performers, Pipilotti Rist, Tori Amos, and other performance artists inspire me stay present in the moment and present in my body as a conduit for creative expression to pour out.

“Portal of Healing," a site-specific installation by Rachel Gonzales (b.1986), a second-generation Filipina-American artist, on view at Fondren Library, Rice University till April 26, 2021.

Crossing one of the most remembered years in history, transitioning from 2020 to 2021, Rachel Gonzales, Filipina American artist, created the site-specific installation, “Portal of Healing” in the Fondren Library, to hold space for collective grief, despair, avoidance, and the reclamation of joy, resilience, and healing in the present moment.

Bringing together their stories of migration from another country across the ocean and sharing them in this container, “Portal of Healing” serves as a sanctuary for remembrance, prayer and meditation.

Read the Press Release by Rice University
Listen to an Artist Talk with Rachel Gonzales

Houston is now home to a beautiful BTS mural that has been dedicated to Uvalde shooting victim Amerie Jo Garza. Ten-year-old Amerie is remembered as a hero in the May 24 attack at Robb Elementary School for calling 911 to help her classmates and teachers, according to Chron.

Amerie's love for BTS will live on in the form of a colorful mural outside Ninja Ramen on Washington Avenue. The mural features the seven members of the South Korean boy band smiling in front of the Houston skyline. Amerie's name is written above the BTS logo in the center of the mural, which was painted by local artists Rachel Gonzales and Caroline Truong. Also featured in the mural are the names of other BTS Army members who helped contribute to its creation, Chron reported.

On Instagram, Gonzales said the mural is "Dedicated to our ARMY sister Amerie Jo Garza 💜."

Read the iheart.com article
Read the Houston Chronicle article

5”x7” mixed media on paper was created in response to voter suppression and the countless number of Black lives lost under white supremacy and existing power structures in the US.

Spread Thick is a collection of poems written in the first year of the pandemic. Cover art by Houston-based artist Rachel Gonzales.

“Fondren After Dark | Embodying Healing” is a dance performance in collaboration with site-specific art installation “Portal of Healing,” at the Fondren Library, Rice University.

In this studio visit, Filipina-American artist, Rachel Gonzales, talked about her practices, her sources of inspiration, her relationships with family, friends, and romantic ones, and showed the Archive her artworks (including in the studio and in the exhibition space in Sawyer Yard), personal collections and some of her journals.

Film recorded by: Christine Wu, Ann Shi
Film edited by: Ann Shi

This recording and transcript form part of a collection of oral history interviews conducted by the Chao Center for Asian Studies at Rice University.

Visit us at haaa.rice.edu.

"Portal of Healing: Crossing the Bridge Together" by Rachel Gonzales. This video includes Part I. Virtual Walkthrough, Part II. Q&A with Rachel Gonzales, Part III. Experience Healing in the Portal, Part IV. The Creative Process.

Hanging over the sideboard is a beautiful painting by Rachel Gonzales, who worked with Wallace at Ziegler Cooper before leaving her job in architecture to launch a career as an artist. She maintains an art studio at Sawyer Yards.