Dylan Rose Rheingold and Gwyneth Giller wander through Girl Talk, where tender things linger between dreams, dress-up, and Jane Birkin.
My conversation with Dylan unfolds right before the holidays after much anticipation, the kind that feels like waiting for a sleepover you’ve been begging your parents to let you have. We first met at her 2025 show, The Blueprint. Her paintings spoke a quiet emotional quality, mirroring my own ideas around girlhood. We talk about recurring dreams—some haunted, some nonchalant—and the strange way they linger into waking life. We trade first-kiss stories (actual nightmare), memories of playing dress-up, and our shared yearning to believe in things again.
It’s a conversation that feels soft around the edges, like staying up too late and whispering so no one hears you. Tune in for sweetness tucked into ordinary moments, and an undying admiration of P!nk.
Gwyneth Giller: Where did you just get back from?
Dylan Rose Rheingold: Florida.
GG: Is that where you’re from?
DR: No, but my grandpa lives in Florida now. My flight got canceled coming back because of the snowstorm. I was on the phone with the airlines for hours trying to rebook.
GG: But you got on a flight eventually, right?
DR: Yes…After treacherous lengths were taken.
GG: Did you watch a movie on the plane?
DR: So glad you asked — no. I notoriously love to watch the map on any flight. Map and music is all I partake in.
GG: [laughs] Why? Do you have flight anxiety?
DR: No, I just love watching the map. It makes me feel like I’m the pilot, like I have an insider scoop.
GG: You’re so funny. Do you ever talk to your seatmates?
DR: It depends on the destination. Like going to Florida to visit my grandpa? No, not interested. But the last time I flew to Rome for my solo show, I was alone and ended up talking to the people next to me because they were Italian and I wanted recommendations.
GG: Sometimes those conversations are the weirdest, most exciting interactions.
DR: True. I do that a lot with my cab drivers.
GG: That’s the best, they know everything.
DR: I had a great conversation with my cab driver the night before Thanksgiving. I love connecting on a deeper level with New Yorkers in such a short period of time, intoxicated or sober, it doesn’t matter.
GG: What was your conversation with this cab driver?
DR: He was telling me about his family and all the people he was going to have at his gathering. He talked about how there’s always 40-plus people at his grandma’s spot in Queens and how he was working that night to make money for it. At the end, I felt so bad because when I asked “what time are you going to go over tomorrow?” and he said he wasn’t sure he was even going to make it because he really needed to work to support them. That’s love.
GG: My heart.
DR: Note to self: never complain about anything.
GG: Where are you from originally?
DR: NY, grew up in LI. What about you?
GG: Arizona.
DR: I really want to go out West. I’ve never been, except for California, but I really want to see the Grand Canyon and Sedona. Not to sound cliché but it looks ethereal.
GG: I got my first period ever at the Grand Canyon.
DR: That’s a really powerful metaphor for something—maybe something bigger than even you and I can even process.
GG: Honestly, that’s what it felt like.
DR: I don’t know why that just gave me a Christmas déjà vu.
GG. What’s your favorite Christmas memory?
DR: Oh my god. My mom’s mom—who I called Obachan—lived in Massachusetts, so probably my favorite Christmas memories are from going up there as a kid, playing in the snow with their neighbor’s dog, Otis, or the food she’d make. She made gingerbread men and whoopie pies. I miss her a lot.
What about you?
GG: I think my favorite Christmas memory is just having that whimsical feeling of actually believing in Santa. Every year it hits me that I’ll probably never experience that blind faith again.
DR: Oh, I love that. I don’t have the same connection to the holiday. Maybe that’s the half-Jewish in me coming through, I’ve always been like: why do these mythical characters get to pick and choose which kids and families they visit?
GG: Did you ever believe in the tooth fairy?
DR: I did. That was probably where my blind belief really went.
GG: The tooth fairy is for the girls.
DR: 100%. But I will say, I got humbled by the tooth fairy in kindergarten. There was a girl in my class who lost her tooth before me and came to school saying the tooth fairy brought her a mini portable DVD player.
So when I lost my tooth, I told my mom, “I need stationery—I’m going to leave the tooth fairy a note. I’m going to ask for a portable DVD player.” And my mom was like, “I don’t think that tooth fairy comes to our house. That was probably just her neighborhood.”
GG: [laughs] She’s like, “Maybe a dollar?” My mom still has a box with eight of my baby teeth.
DR: You should make a necklace out of them. Then if you have a daughter someday, you could give it to her, she’d be the coolest kid in school.
GG: Do you have a favorite childhood photo of yourself? Maybe a favorite outfit or accessory?
DR: Oh my god. I honestly can’t remember any specific outfits because the fits were kind of messy. But when I was a baby, I was born with a full head of hair that stuck straight up—I was a spectacle. I imagine people looking at me like, “Oh my god, can we pet her?” So I think my hair—the mohawk craziness—was my favorite accessory.
GG: At least you had hair! I was bald. Everyone thought I was a boy when my mom dressed me in overalls.
DR: I feel like every mom dressed their kid in overalls and gave them bangs. I remember rebelling and wanting to grow mine out so badly. I was like, “I will not rock these bangs.” I was so angsty about it.
GG: Who was your first kiss?
DR: I think it was 8th or 9th grade. I think I was the last of all my friends. It was still warm out, I want to say it was crisp September air. The boy was a couple years older, a ginger. I remember calling my friends afterward and saying, “It was not like the movies at all.” I really thought it would be like an animated scene—birds chirping, butterflies everywhere…instead it just felt slimy.
GG: I had a similar situation. The guy I had my first kiss with was older too. We went to a movie, and the whole movie we just sat there. Nothing happened. Then the movie ends, everyone’s standing up for the credits, and he just grabs my face. It was so unromantic—so gross. I think about it all the time and cringe.
DR: What movie was it?
GG: I truly couldn’t tell you. What was the last dream you had?
DR: Oh just last night, I was in this house—kind of like Edward Scissorhands—you know that attic scene?
GG: Of course.
DR: So, we were in this abandoned attic, and a bunch of bats flew out when someone opened a door or window. So in my dream I’m thinking, “Oh my god, do I have a bat vaccine? If one bites me, am I going to get rabies?” I was standing there flapping my arms up and down, and I woke up doing the same movement. I thought I was having a stroke.
GG: That’s so crazy.
DR: What about you?
GG: I don’t think I had a significant dream last night. But my last memorable dream… I was sitting at my friend’s kitchen table, and I was like, “Do you want another beer?” She said yes, so I stood up to get her a beer—but then I actually stood up from my sleep and woke up standing next to my bed. My boyfriend woke up too and looked at me so confused and I just turned to him and said, “I was just about to grab Nan a beer” And he was like, “What the fuck?”
DR: Like, you actually stood up while asleep? [laughs]
GG: Yes. Do you have any recurring dream motifs? Do they ever play into your paintings?
DR: They do. Actually, in my last show, I painted an image that came from a recurring dream. That was the first time I’ve ever done that, which was really interesting.
It was a recurring dream where I had this polar bear. I was really admiring it—championing the polar bear. But then, it got sick and started dying. Then, it was no longer alive, and I couldn’t let it go. I was trying to physically preserve it. I don’t remember who, but someone in the dream was trying to make me get rid of it because it wasn’t breathing anymore and I tried to put it in my bedroom as a decorative object or trophy-like character in the corner.
I had that dream multiple times, so I thought, “This is interesting. Maybe it means something bigger.” Looking back now, I think it represents my Obachan getting cancer and enduring a slow painful death in a short period of time. A lot of change I had no control over during that time.
GG: That’s awful, I’m so sorry. How do you usually conceive your compositions?
DR: A lot of my compositions start from this automatic drawing process I do, which feels very dream-adjacent. It’s about working without any preconceived plan—no references—just trying to be as mundane as possible, which sometimes ends up super surreal. I start by doing a bunch of drawings, then pick apart little details and put them together to see what repeats. I notice what objects, ideas, or notions keep showing up in different ways.
When I connect the dots, it usually relates to what I’m thinking about subconsciously or what’s on my mind daily—what chapter of life I’m in.
GG: Speaking of the surreal, what do you think the song title or lyrics of Eyes Without a Face mean? You know, that Billy Idol song?
DR: Yeah, that’s like [sings] “Eyes without a faceee.”
GG: [laughs] Exactly. If you had to apply meaning to it.
DR: I think I’d have to look at the rest of the lyrics, but…if someone said Eyes Without a Face, I’d think maybe it means lacking your own sense of identity or looking through the lens of other people—like abiding by social constraints.
GG: What kind of music do you listen to when you’re in the studio and painting?
DR: I listen to a lot of different types of music. Whether I’m home or in the studio, there’s always music playing. So it really depends on the vibe I’m feeling.
GG: Do you have Spotify? Will you share your wrapped analysis?
DR: I’m an Apple Music girlie.
GG: Okay, fine.What would your wrapped be?
DR: It’s honestly embarrassing this year it was many white indie guys but my studio playlist currently is Beach House, Velvet Underground, Serge Gainsbourg and Jane Birkin, Townes Van Zandt, Neil Young, The Smiths—
GG: Okay depressing.
DR: Also Sly & The Family Stone, Etta James, The Five Stairsteps, and a bunch of Reggae music. There are happy vibes mixed in too, but definitely some darkness. [laughs]
GG: Do you listen to lyrics when you’re painting?
DR: Yeah, I really like to process the lyrics.
GG: Me too. Some people it doesn’t matter to, but for me, lyrics matter a lot.
DR: If I’m thinking about something intricate, I like music where the writing is impactful more than the sound. But sometimes I do the opposite—I don’t want anything distracting. I’ll listen to classical, Beethoven, or music in languages I can’t understand. You can really lock in when you don’t know the words or there aren’t any.
GG: I love doing that—my brain kind of turns off. Did you ever have a poster in your room as a teenager?
DR: I had a wooden wall. It looked like a log cabin. I plastered it with drawings, posters, and lights at one point. But I definitely never had posters of boys. I remember, obviously, in first grade loving Zac Efron and Justin Bieber when they first came out—but I never had posters of them.
GG: I also had a huge crush on Zac Efron and JB.
DR: I think that was just part of formative or sexual development.
GG: I remember watching the Believer movie and for the first time was like, “I am a sexual being.”
DR: Yeah, I was like, “Wait…… I love him.”
GG: So what were your posters?
DR: Mostly just girls I loved. Avril Lavigne, P!nk—
GG: I used to call my best friend on the landline and we’d just sing P!nk together on the phone.
DR: Oh my god. What was that album where she had hair like this (does hair into a quick side-part) and was lying on the couch?
GG: M!ssundaztood. I was obsessed with that.
DR: I thought she was the coolest. I wanted to be just like her when I grew up. She’s such a badass.
GG: I love that you had no boys on your walls.
DR: No, never. I only had girls I thought were cool and was inspired by in some way
GG: Is there a film that directly influences your visual language in your work?
DR: No one’s asked me that before. The first thing that comes to mind is this clip from an old French movie, Le Grand Amour (1969).
That reminds me of an Instagram swipey I made years ago clipping a scene from it and connecting some other dots. First, there was a photo from an exhibition I saw at the New Museum when I was in high school that had flowers coming out of sound speakers on the floor of a blue carpeted room. Then, the next clip was from an old Looney Tunes clip—flowers in a garden, dancing with faces, all different types. Then the next clip was from that French movie: people lying on beds on a desolate country road. The beds were like cars. My interpretation is they’re on their way to Dreamland.
There’s a man on the side of the road, his bed messed up and pajamas covered in oil, like a mechanic fixing a car. The man just keeps going on his way. He keeps having recurring dreams while in bed with his wife or girlfriend, dreaming about another woman. It’s a surreal, strange movie.
GG: Did that kind of experience inform your installation for Blueprint—the one with the vintage TV in the corner, where you measured people’s heights and wrote their names on the wall?
DR: Yeah, it really conveys that feeling of girlhood, bedroom, sleepover vibes.
GG: Do you have a core girlhood memory?
DR: Playing dress-up when I was a kid. We had a dress-up box in the basement. My sister and I—we weren’t really a game family, but we loved playing dress-up. It was a mix of past pieces from dance recitals and just random clothes or things my mom had lying around. Dress up inspired my first solo show in Rome actually at T293, it was a commentary on contemporary escapism called: Lost In the Dress Up Bin.
GG: I feel like you can grow up, but those parts of you don’t really go away. Any time I get to go to an event, I get excited to play dress-up—mix and match, take on another identity. Fashion is literally costume wear. Isn’t fashion called “costume” in French?
DR: I don’t know, but I’d like to say yes.
GG: When do you feel most sexy?
DR: Hmmm, I think I feel most sexy when my mindset is right. When I’m feeling confident, I feel unshakable and uniquely one-of-one in all categories.
GG: When do you feel most feral?
DR: What’s the exact definition of feral?
GG: I think it’s wild, fierce, uncontrolled, crazy, uninhibited.
DR: I think I try to turn off my brain sometimes to get there, like through meditation or automatic drawing—just letting go without planning. I’m not usually wild or out of control, and I don’t like being that way. But those practices help me get close to that feeling.
GG: I’m dying that your response to feeling most feral is meditation.
DR: What about you?
GG: Dirty martini.
DR: [laughs]
GG: When do you feel the most…?
DR: Unfortunately, I’m always feeling a lot—whether I want to or not. I have a lot of feelings in this body.
GG: Naturally, me too. If you could design an Empire State Building color scheme and pattern, what would it be?
DR: Probably pink, red, and white with a cherry blossom motif—something really kawaii.
GG: Who’s your favorite Gossip Girl character?
DR: Not Serena.
GG: Real. Okay. Fuck, marry, kill: Chuck, Nate, Dan.
DR: I don’t know if I can answer that honestly. I don’t know all the characters well enough.
GG: Okay, pass. How did Maude Apatow find your work?
DR: My friend and collector Jenna Perry introduced us.
GG: Oh, Jenna Perry the hair stylist?
DR: Yes she’s incredible. She collected a painting of mine for her new salon when they expanded to SoHo. Maud was one of her clients and saw it there and Jenna connected us
GG: What was the last book you read?
DR: Meditations by Marcus Aurelius. It’s a book on stoicism and it really moved me. It’s basically all journal entries—reflections and advice about life by an old Roman emperor. It feels like getting an inside scoop on someone’s prized possession, like he holds all the wisdom and answers you need.
You should read it. You can borrow my copy — I annotated it a lot.
GG: I love when people annotate their books. It’s so intimate.
DR: My mom used to work at a library, so she was always on me about buying books, but I needed to in order to annotate. I’ve never gotten a trophy. I have a bookshelf, so in my head, that’s my trophy shelf. Reading a book is an accomplishment and then it lives there. It feels like a childhood trophy I never got.
GG: I’m starting a petition to get you a trophy.
DR: Honestly, when you gave me that Girl Talk ribbon at dinner, I was like, “Wow, this is big.” I felt healed. I have it in my room.
GG: What’s your go-to girl dinner?
DR: Penne with butter and Parmesan cheese. And a Coke.
GG: Coke or Diet Coke?
DR: Real Coke—Mexican Coke, real sugar.
GG: If you could heist anything from the Met, what would it be?
DR: Can it be an impossible answer?
GG: Of course.
DR: There’s a permanent Water Stone, 1986 installation by Isamu Noguchi — basically a giant smooth boulder with water coming out of it. There’s a funny video of him installing it, working with curators at the Met. They’re offering suggestions, and he’s not having it. I’ll send it to you, he cracks me up. I would definitely want that.
GG: Who raised you figuratively?
DR: Figuratively? Hm I don’t know. Who raised you?
GG: Maybe Cruella De Vil.
DR: That’s really good. My sixth birthday party was 101 Dalmatians themed. Wait, I have one — not who raised me, but something I think about often. Do you remember the Lizzie McGuire show?
GG: Yes!
DR: She didn’t raise me but maybe she was a babysitter?
GG: If today was your last day on Earth, what would you do?
DR: Am I going to die or what?
GG: Yes.
DR: I’d probably spend the day eating really good food — I have IBS, so a lot of things I’d want to eat would cause me pain. I’d go wild, eat everything. Then perhaps jump off a building, just to know what it feels like.
GG: That’s a hilarious ending.
Written by Gwyneth Giller.
