Richard Gonçalves

b500 magazine

RICHARD GONÇALVES ROCS Motorsports / Studio RG Art

Artist, designer and custom car builder, Rich operates ROCS Motorsports in New Jersey, a custom house founded in 1995 reimagining and personalising vintage Porsche cars. The same space houses Studio RG Art from where his paintings, sculptures and reimagined watches are generated.

H ere is one I am sure you have heard at least a handful of times; a child sees a Porsche for the first time and is in awe at its beauty, its color, its sleek movement or its sound...if that child was lucky enough he or she experienced the above all at once. Moments like these are often the big bang to a life filled with aspiration. Its utterly amazing how motivational and impactful a car can be on one’s life and how it can lead you to do certain things, but lets digress for a moment and let’s talk about the usual do’s and don’ts of custom car building and customization in general.

Just because something can be done, it doesn’t mean it should be right? Well not so fast, I think that question carries with it more gray area and perhaps even gray matter than a quick answer can satisfy. Allow me to elaborate before you shut the door and run out the back to gather up a Porsche posse.

I don’t believe anything is ever simple nor simply cut and dry, what I do believe is that our own realities can only benefit from looking at the very things we may find unusual without immediate interjection by momentarily casting aside common views and perceptions, even if just temporarily.

I’m talking about ROCS ART CARS, a movement we unveiled a few years ago which actually has nearly two decades of development and maturing in the making.

Even though I feel that “art car” is a bit of a misnomer, it is what people started calling them, dubbed I think by the lack of a better set of words to describe our take on these cars that carry this highly detailed, nostalgia infused treatment. When you hear art car you hear BMW art cars and the likes of Lichtenstein, Stella, etc. or Ichwan Noor’s rolled up beetle. But then to simply call them Hotrods, which they also are doesn’t really quite fully capture the full essence of what they are in totality and let’s not raise any eyebrows by calling them outlaws which, seems to be the more marketing friendly and popular term adopted by the Porsche populace, the rightful bearers of which are the Emory family.

Speaking of families and now that my art car dissertation has been submitted I’d like to tell you my story.

I was born in Paris to Portuguese parents, my father who had begun his automotive technical career at the age of 12 and found himself racing Mini Coopers in Portugal, soon realized that if his larger automobilist dreams were to be realized that he likely would have to do it elsewhere and so he set his sights on Paris. By the time I was born my parents were running a successful sports car specialty shop dedicated to selling, servicing and modifying mostly Porsche and Ferrari. He was also racing 911s and while I would love to say that my earliest memories were of my father racing and the glorified lifestyle that went along with it, I am the youngest of three and those memories if any, actually belong to my older brother Paul. I experienced a tiny glimpse of it however, just enough to hold the door cracked open. A lot of it via family stories of the abundance of eclectic cars, a few of the old photos I still retain today, stories of eccentric showmanship and flair, barefoot Parisian night club appearances. The alluring tales romanticized by an imaginative, starry eyed little boy.

By the time I was fourteen my parents had long divorced and I was living in Portugal with mom when I decided I wanted to experience life with dad. So I was pre-packing my bags for Geneva, Switzerland when I learned my father was coming to the States. New York? Well that’s huge and

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I love Ghost Busters; so hell yeah New York here I come!

The summer of 1985 was bittersweet as I looked back and waved goodbye to my sister and brother and along with that a closed chapter of my life but I was eager for the next one and new experiences and so I arrived at JFK to a sea of cars the size of small villas.

I recall the ride to my new home, sliding around the shiny tufted red leather back couch of a black Fleetwood Brougham and having to prop myself up by the front headrests in order to listen to him speak, Portuguese, French then English depending on whom he

was addressing, a haze of cigar smoke gleaming off his aviators that created sparkly swirls, a familiar look from pictures and a voice I normally got to hear via the telephone.

So I was in the presence of the man I glorified, the hero of my grasp-less early childhood. Life had cheated me long enough out of the experience and I was determined to live it, to find out as much as I could and to learn even more…and learn I did. Even though life Stateside was quite different, I learned what I needed to learn while learning what I had to. The allure, if not illusion of a glorious era even though gone, I finally got

and I understood it fully. That period I lived with dad allowed me to absorb it all and allowed me to carry on and become who I am today, the feeling remains and the knowledge I fully own. The starry-eyed little boy hasn’t left, he is right here and if there is anything he is sure about in life is that he learned to build you one special Porsche as a result, one that embodies soul, feeling and nostalgia….

Have I told you about the time I first saw a 911? … It was a black and white photo and it was of my dad going around a race track…

How may I help you?

Dijon, circa 1970

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