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ACE AIR: ANGELA ROGERS

Program: Ace AIR
Location: Ace Hotel New York
Date of Stay: 01.27.19
Artist: Angela Rogers

During her residency at Ace Hotel New York, artist Angela Rogers created her own tarot card deck featuring illustrations of the twenty-two Major Arcana. She also made a black wire hand to accompany the deck and displayed the work atop an emerald green silk scarf on her night table, with two quarters thrown into the mix “for luck or charity.” Angela shares: 

It was great to mix together my knowledge of the oracle w art… Staying up all night working on this art-ritual of sorts I went into the “zone” and in the late morning took a long hot bath for the finale… This deck is one of a kind. I feel it is already a collectible. 

Angela Rogers is a self-taught artist, singer, poet and performer. The style of her figurative paintings is strongly influenced by her “Southern Gothic” childhood and her lifelong interest in the occult. Angela incorporates a range of mystical symbolism in her work, which includes assemblages – dubbed “poppets” –intricately wrapped in multi-hued yarn. References to addiction and institutionalization often appear in her pieces, as does the influence of a near-death experience after surgery for brain trauma in 2012. She has exhibited at the Outsider Art Fair and published a feminist comic book titled No One Likes a Woman.

This January, our Artists in Residence are curated by Fountain House Gallery and Studio, which provides an environment for artists living with mental illness to express their creative visions and exhibit their work. Founded by Fountain House in 2000 as a not-for-profit exhibition space for its member-artists living and working with mental illness, the Gallery sells original artworks and collaborates with a wide network of artists, curators and cultural institutions. Embracing artists who are emerging or established, trained or self-taught, Fountain House Gallery cultivates artistic growth, makes a vital contribution to the New York arts community and challenges the stigma surrounding mental illness.