Rachel Matos is a 23 year old Latina artist residing in Miami, Florida. Born in San Diego, she moved to Puerto Rico at the age of 3. Rachel lived in Puerto Rico until the age of 13 and then moved to Miami. She currently works as an art teacher in the hopes of traveling and inspiring others around the world with her art.

When did you have your epiphany that you were meant to be an artist?

I actually began taking private art lessons in Puerto Rico at the age of 12 but it wasn’t until I got to middle school and I painted, what back then seemed like the best painting in the world, a picture of a girl in a basketball court. Looking back now I don’t know exactly what gave me so much confidence about my talents but ever since that painting I knew there was nothing else I wanted to do than be an artist. No matter what the cost.

What are the factors that influence you? What is your muse?

I have always been very interested in the female figure as a thing of beauty; the power that we have as women and how we can use our bodies as power rather than as an object. The urban world has also had an effect on me as far as my color palette goes. My paintings tend to be very bright and alive, very saturated in resemblance to graffiti. Many things catch my eye but for some reason I always end up tying it back to the figure and the urban.

We don’t want to sound cliché, but as a woman and Latina, do you find that there are greater challenges in the art world for ...