Art from the Heart: Angela Rose
The death of a child brings unspeakable grief, a lonely experience which challenges the connection to life and the joyful memories of those who remain. Extraordinary artist and mother Angela Rose has drawn from her private grief to create a public sanctuary for others who have endured the loss of a beloved child. She spent a year contemplating the lives of nine children whose family members and friends entrusted her with their memories. The result is “Come Play One More Day”, a joyful contemporary interactive sculpture trail currently installed in an expanse of urban desert outside Toscana Studio and Gallery in Oro Valley, Arizona. You are invited to virtually experience this trail and the journey of its creation by this extraordinary artist by walking this trail with her.
Ian Patrick Sullivan loved puppets. Throughout his eleven years of life, Sesame Street characters gave him particular joy. To commemorate her son’s joy, Rose created a nine foot Big Bird puppet for the 2006 Tucson All Souls’ Procession, an annual Tucson event which began in 1990 as a ritualistic performance by artist Susan Johnson in creative memory of her father and now draws about 7500 spectators and participants each year. True to her calling as a public artist who believes that the audience completes her work, Rose invited her community to place mementos of beloved children into the wagon pulled by Big Bird in the procession. She called her performance “Love Never Ends”, a title that encapsulates her belief that love is an electric connection that we each have the responsibility to pass to one another. Family and friends of nine children placed objects into Big Bird’s wagon that night.
Mementos
“Once I had collected the mementos, I felt such a huge responsibility to the families. It was such an honor to be entrusted with their memories,” explains Rose. For months, she walked every day in the desert near her home and studio north of Tucson which she shares with her husband, sculptor, Aurelio Rosano, contemplating the children’s lives as revealed in the tokens donated by their loved ones. While she had originally envisioned completing a single sculpture using the mementos as her media, Rose found that each object was compelling on its own. “They each wanted to tell their own story,” she says.
Saguaro Sunburst
The idea to create a singular piece evolved into the idea to create an individual sculpture for each child inspired by the mementos. Rose began with the child she knew best, her son Ian who died in 1998. After his death, Rose says, her world fell apart. She sold her stake in the handmade tile business she had cofounded and left to continue her education as a non-traditional student at Smith College, where she earned a BFA in 2002. When she returned to Tucson, she found it difficult to speak of her son to new friends who had never known him. “I never wanted to upset anyone or exploit my children,” Rose explains, yet she needed to find a way to include Ian and David Michael, her first son who lived for only nine hours, in her life.
Rose knew that the hushed tones of traditional forms of commemoration would not do to capture the energy and joy with which Ian and the other children who inspired this project had lived. With characteristic resourcefulness, Rose identified modern materials that were readily available to her and set to work. Shaping electrical conduit tubing into a tree like form and painting it with colors inspired by Ian’s favorite puppets, Rose created “Saguaro Sunburst”. This sculpture captures her son’s exuberance in its dynamic shape and fanciful detail. Marbles attached to the branch ends and scattered beneath the tree encourage childlike imagination: Are they magical fruit? What would happen if we tasted them? Birds sometimes perch in the branches of this sculpture, as if it were a living tree. This interspersion of steel and nature symbolizes the question that Rose bravely asks and responds to with this project: “How do you fold the loss of a child into your life?”
 Bouquet
Rose remembers that as a young child she and her brothers and sisters would recite a prayer asking for blessings for each other and also for their brother, Anthony, who lived only five days. Beyond these prayers, however, the family did not speak of Anthony. “I think my mother was very surprised that I remembered and created this sculpture for him,” she says. At the exhibit opening, I watched as a young boy circled the bouquet with hands stretched above his head to try and touch the colorful loops. Sometimes, words are too much.
Desert Flower
The meandering trail resembles the path of a children’s board game, and to wander it is to play and discover. Here, a flower hides among the paddles of a prickly pear cactus. Each sculpture along the path is marked with a number corresponding to a child identified in the exhibit guide. This piece was created for Sebella Paz; a photo of the infant swaddled in a bright pink blanket was lovingly pasted to golden angel wings and donated anonymously to Rose. “Parents who have lost children want to hear their child’s name and they want others to know that they lived,” says the artist.
 Crescendo
Theresa Bertz, a Boston-area art collector, voices best the generous intent of Come Play One More Day. “People are always searching for ways to deal with loss and the things we’ve collected from those we loved very much. Art is a good way for people to keep going on.” This piece was inspired by a lock of hair from Bertz’s stillborn son, Cameron. The sky blue undersides of the coils draw the viewer’s eye up to contemplate the Arizona sky while the coppery strands anchor us here on earth.
Rhapsody
“Angela puts her heart into everything she does. She always has“ says Elisa Ochoa, who has known the artist since she was a teenager. This piece was created for Elisa’s son Carlos Badillo, who loved music and looked incredible in blue. “She has such a way of showing love and care, not only in the piece she made for Carlos but in all of the sculptures and in all of the things she has made throughout her life. I felt such peace and movement in the garden she created.”
Proud Warrior
Proud Warrior was inspired by a boy named Nathaniel whose memento showcased his family’s pride in the gifts this young organ donor provided to other children upon his death. The bare steel and squat pose also remind us of the strength of those who grieve. “You have to be strong,” says Rose, “to stay in this world and carry grief.” As an artist who not only stayed in this world but generously gave of her talents to help others carry their burdens, there is no doubt about Angela’s strength of character. This piece reminds us of her physical strength as well—she shaped the steel for all of these sculptures by hand.
The artist, pictured here in one of the contemplative nooks she created along the trail, is now looking for a permanent home for the exhibit. She hopes to find a public space where people of all ages could enjoy the sculptures and where those who are grieving could go to be alone with their thoughts without feeling lonely. In making public her work dealing with the most private of experiences, this extraordinarily compassionate and thoughtful artist has made sure that those who encounter her art will know that they are not alone.
Angela Rose is an artist who lives and works in Tucson, Arizona. You can find her work at Toscana Studio and Gallery in Tucson and Art Space in Scottsdale. www.angelarose.org/resume.html.With the exception of the photo of Mementos and portrait of Angela Rose, all photos in this story are credited to Steven Meckler.
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