Nature Is Healing

Preston Gaines’ pandemic hobby-turned-art form lifts a looking-glass to our relationship with the natural world.

By Peter Simek

Like the rest of the world, in spring of 2020, Preston Gaines was confined to his apartment due to the COVID-19 lockdown, transitioning to remote work and finding new ways to spend the time he suddenly found on his hands.

A talented young architect charting a promising career with the firm PGAL, Gaines turned his attention to the spaces in and around his Third Ward apartment complex. He began gardening the common areas and amassing a collection of houseplants.

The hobby quickly became an obsession. Gaines contacted a local company that supplies plants to offices and struck a deal to acquire their surplus stock. His apartment was soon teeming with plants. Gaines says the drive was partly therapeutic, partly self-expressive. “It was a time when many people sought comfort in activities that brought them joy,” he says. “For me, that solace was found in nurturing plants.”

What Gaines didn’t anticipate was his houseplants' transformative effect on his career.

Blooming Passion

Gaines’ interests span the gamut of art, architecture and design. He grew up in Crowley, Texas, southwest of Fort Worth, in the rural fringe of the metro area.

“My childhood was characterized by endless open land, fields and gravel roads that surrounded our home,” he says. “Our adventures were reminiscent of the whimsical 1988 Japanese animated film by Hayao Miyazaki, ‘My Neighbor Totoro,’ where two young sisters discover magical creatures living in the forest near their home.”

While considering career options, architecture appeared to be the most practical route to transform these creative experiences into a realistic career path. But the lockdown allowed Gaines to rediscover whimsy. His architectural practice evolved in a new, multidisciplinary direction that has been, well, organic.

Grow With the Flow

Gaines staged a warehouse festival event, "Grow with the Flow, " combining art, nature and community empowerment. He included plants to experiences through interactive workshops, discussions and performances designed to foster a sense of belonging, collaboration and growth. He experimented, combining design, video and graphic elements into his immersive installations.

These projects led to collaborations with Project Row Houses and the Museum of Contemporary Arts Houston. In August 2022, he left his architecture job to focus on art and became the University of Houston’s Cynthia Woods Mitchell Center for the Arts Artist in Residence.

Mixing Mediums

Gaines’ work isn’t easily pigeonholed. A wall-sized projected image of technicolor flowers references the pop art of Andy Warhol and psychedelic album covers of the 1960s. His natural subjects' abstract geometry feels inspired by nature and somehow otherworldly. Paired with living plants, it teases an ontological disconnect between how we experience the natural world.

Gaines collects various dynamic experiences and creative tangents into a concept he coined “Inanimate Nature”—“the idea of transcending boundaries between the natural and artificial while delving into the symbolic and philosophical dimensions of mathematics and geometry.”

At its core, Gaines’ work pursues the sensual experience of nature that harkens back to the Houston artist’s pandemic-inspired reengagement with the natural elements that provide solace during global trauma.

“Art can impact communities by providing a platform for selfexpression, healing and empowerment,” Gaines says. “My interactions with various communities and organizations within Houston have fostered a strong sense of social responsibility and a commitment to using my art to uplift and empower those around me.”