artist Archives

Why I’m Inspired by Art and Artists

By Rachel Dacus | December 7, 2025December 7, 2025 by Rachel Dacus

My new poetry collection. The Artist’s House is a cultural autobiography, honoring the literature, art, and artists that have shaped my writing, with illustrations and interactive features. It will include Art Nouveau style drawings and links to music, dance, and poetry online. Listen to a song by Jacob Collier while reading a poem about Emily Dickinson’s lines dueling with Taylor Swift’s. Watch a performance of Twyla Tharp’s “In The Upper Rooms” ballet after reading the…

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Art & artists are a theme in my fiction and poetry

By Rachel Dacus | April 30, 2025April 30, 2025 by Rachel Dacus

Art and artists are a theme in my fiction and poetry. In poetry, it’s called ekphrastic. I’m working on an ekphrastic poetry collection titled The Artist’s House, inspired by my llongtime association with visual artists, musicians, dancers, and writers. My poetry and my novels often feature artists or a response to their work. It’s because I grew up with an artist father who painted constantly and invited many artists to our home and shared studios…

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Art in My Life and Stories

By Rachel Dacus | June 9, 2023June 9, 2023 by Rachel Dacus

Why Art and Artists? My time travel novels often feature art and artists—you may wonder why. It’s because I grew up with an artist father who painted constantly and invited many artist friends to our home. He took us to working studios, local art exhibitions, and art museums in the Los Angeles area. The smell of oil paint and turpentine evokes childhood memories. Saturday afternoons, watching my father mix oil paints and dash paint onto…

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THE TIME GATHERER IS ON SALE NOW – 99 CENTS! Or free with Kindle Unlimited.

By Rachel Dacus | January 24, 2021February 6, 2021 by Rachel Dacus

THE TIME GATHERER IS ON SALE NOW – $.99! Can a young timegatherer find love in another century? Not if a secret society out to eliminate time travel finds him first. George St. James has been genetically gifted with the ability to move through the centuries, but will he find a purpose in folding time? Once he meets Elisabetta Sirani in the 17th century, one of the most gifted and beautiful women artists of her…

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If You Could Travel into the Past, What Good Could You Do?

By Rachel Dacus | January 6, 2018January 6, 2018 by Rachel Dacus

If you suddenly found you could time travel, what good could you hope to do by traveling into the past? Could you time travel to prevent a war or a plague? Would you want to ensure that friendly, intelligent aliens landing on our planet weren’t obliterated by weed-killer? Would you want to change your own history to become richer, more successful, or healthier? Would you try to spare someone close to you a catastrophe? Some…

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Casting the Film Bernini from My Novel THE RENAISSANCE CLUB

By Rachel Dacus | March 25, 2017November 9, 2017 by Rachel Dacus

The Renaissance Club by Rachel Dacus, Fiery Seas Publishing (forthcoming). That felt good to type! Today I’m handing over my final manuscript to the publisher. It feels like handing over the controls of my airplane in mid-flight. Next, they wrap the book with a cover. Very important element. I can’t help but imagine casting Gianlorenzo Bernini, around whom the story unfolds, for the movie. Here he is in his self-portrait, age 26, an image that…

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Listening to the Paint

By Rachel Dacus | September 17, 2016November 9, 2017 by Rachel Dacus

Every once in awhile, an author should Google herself. I did my routine check last night and was amazed to discover that Prairie Schooner, one of my longtime favorite literary journals, had reprinted one of my poems. “Listening to the Paint” appeared in their 2012 issue, at a time that coincided with the record-breaking sale of an abstract painting. So PS chose to include my poem in their series of reprints. The poem is about…