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When Barbara Rachko (barbararachko.art) joined our “Women in the Arts” webinar, she declared with conviction: “I just keep going, whatever is thrown at me. I’m never going to be a victim. You can’t stop me!” 

That resilience has defined her life as much as her art. Before becoming a full-time artist, Barbara served as a Navy officer (she is a retired commander) and trained as a commercial pilot and Boeing-727 flight engineer — disciplines that demanded precision, endurance, and focus. Those same qualities carried her through profound personal loss when her husband, Bryan, was killed in the 9/11 attack on the Pentagon. In the aftermath, Barbara turned even more fiercely toward art, building a practice that became both survival and sanctuary. 

For over four decades, she has honed a singular technique: pastel on sandpaper, depicting the folk traditions, masks, and carved figures she encounters in her travels. From Mexico to Bolivia and India, her paintings transform cultural artifacts into archetypes — striking, colorful, and unflinchingly original. 

Her story was recently captured in the short documentary Barbara Rachko: True Grit, which premiered at the Newport Beach Film Festival and won both an Audience Award and Best in Category. It’s an apt title: Barbara’s grit is unmistakable. In this conversation, she reflects on the balance between freedom and framework, what it means to push through creative block, and why beauty and authenticity matter more than ever. 

You’ve been working with the same medium and subject matter for decades. How did that begin, and how has it sustained you for so long? 

Back in the early 1990s I began using folk art as my subject matter, and I was incredibly lucky. More than thirty years later, I’m still working with it. As artists, we don’t know at the start whether a subject will sustain us, whether it will keep our curiosity alive. For me it has. I’ve always been fascinated by different cultures around the world, and that continues to feed the work. There’s freedom in that kind of framework — I chose pastel on sandpaper and my subject matter.  I don’t have to question it anymore. That choice itself has opened space to keep growing. 

Where is your work leading you now? 

Since 2017 I’ve been creating my Bolivianos series, based on photographs I took in La Paz. After eight years I’m running out of material — many of the photos I’ve already used twice, first for a large painting and then a smaller one.  I enjoy the challenge of creating a painting of the same subject in two very different formats. But I won’t use the photos a third time. I’m planning a return trip to Bolivia in 2026 during Carnival in Oruro. This time I want to see the masks in use — on the street, being danced in, made by the mask-makers themselves, the preparations behind the scenes. I may also make another short film. What excites me is gathering new reference material, seeing the tradition not in glass cases but alive in its own context. 

Travel clearly plays an important role in your practice. What does it give you? 

Travel is the spark. It opens you up, makes you think differently, introduces you to people everywhere. It makes you realize that people are the same wherever you go — which in turn makes all the political divisions and wars feel so senseless. The work itself gets made in silence, but those bright sparks from travel feed that silence. Countries like India and Bolivia are full of character and color. They shift your perspective, and you bring that back to the studio. 

Do particular colors stay with you from those journeys? 

Yes. For Bolivia I think of red, white, and green — the colors of the flag. I even chose to use red frames as a kind of homage. For India, multi-colored patterns always come to mind because of women’s saris and white too, which Hindus wear on important occasions. Certain places attach themselves to your memory through color. 

What stands out from your experiences in India? 

The chaos of the cities. The constant honking, the traffic, the sheer density. I used to think New York was crazy until I went to Delhi and Mumbai — then I came home and New York felt peaceful. But visually, India is extraordinary: the clothing, the buildings, the surprises. Once I was in a bus at a traffic light and saw the back end of an elephant sticking out of a pickup truck. You never forget things like that. They’re unique to a place. 

Your work has been described as “beautiful yet unsettling.” How do you respond to that? 

Not at all. For me, every painting I make is beautiful. Beauty is vital. I see the figures in my paintings as colorful misfits — misunderstood archetypes — not terrifying or unsettling. In the studio, what I’m often doing is solving technical challenges: how to depict feathers in pastel, how to lead the viewer’s eye around the painting USING detail, contrast, or color. The meanings emerge later, when others look and bring their own perspectives. I don’t want to dictate interpretation. People should be free to see what speaks to them. 

Another exhibition was described as “a journey from identity to authenticity.” Does that resonate? 

Yes, especially the authenticity part.

My work has always come from a deep place. Each painting is the inevitable result of three or four months of daily engagement — the constant adjustments, decisions, and struggles. By the time it’s finished, it couldn’t be any other way. That, to me, is authenticity.

Identity may be what we inherit — culture, upbringing, circumstance. Authenticity is what we strip back to, the choices we make that reflect our core. As I get older, I’ve been shedding what doesn’t serve me. I want to use my time and energy on what makes me a better artist and a better person. 

You’re also known for being remarkably consistent with your blog and writing. How do you keep that rhythm? 

It’s become habit. I started in 2012 and now I post twice a week. On Wednesdays, a quote from a book I’m reading, paired with a photo. On Saturdays, I rotate: one week “What’s on the Easel,” another a travel photo, and twice a month a short reflection. Only two posts a month require real writing, so it’s sustainable. Consistency has been everything. 

You once faced a major creative block. How did you break through it? 

That was in 2007, after I finished my Domestic Threats series. The last painting in that series hardly interested  me. I was wringing my hands, thinking, “I’m a full-time artist not making art — what do I do NOW?” It was frightening. At the time, I was also taking a jazz history class at Lincoln Center. One day the instructor spoke about Miles Davis. He explained how Davis moved away from bebop — where musicians packed in as many notes as possible to show off — to cool jazz, where every note carried weight. And something clicked. I realized I’d been working like bebop: showing off meticulous detail, every stitch of fabric, every grain in a wooden floor. That revelation was my way forward. 

I stripped everything back. No more domestic backdrops. Just the figures, placed against solid black. Only what mattered. That was the beginning of my Black Paintings. It was like a lightbulb going off. The block that had haunted me for months lifted in an instant, because I’d found a new way to speak. I realized the black background represented the dark place i had emerged from; the vibrant figures symbolized resilience and life.  

Recently you were in Paris and saw the David Hockney retrospective. What struck you most? 

It was spectacular. I spent three and a half hours there, which I never do — usually two is my limit. I had known his LA work, but I wasn’t aware of so much else, including the Normandy pieces. And yes, the iPad drawings impressed me. I like that he keeps evolving, trying new tools, staying current. At his age that’s remarkable. As someone who has focused on one medium my whole life, I admire artists who reinvent themselves again and again.