Bio of Jim Rose, Artist | In Memoriam
Jim Rose (1966 – 2023) was an American artist and craftsman who constructed handmade steel furniture, objects, and sculpture. Born in Indiana, Jim Rose lived in Paris, Puerto Rico, and England through high school. He returned to the United States to attend Bard College in upstate New York. After a year at Bard, Jim transferred to the School of the Art Institute in Chicago, and graduated with a BFA in 1988.
Jim produced multiple bodies of work including Shaker-inspired pieces, works motivated by the quilts of Gee’s Bend, and work derived from early Chinese furnishings. Primarily working with steel found in the scrap yards across the Midwest, his selection of aged steel results in a patina directly related to that of aged wood while his colored strips beautifully mimic worn cloth. He also worked on collage and sculptural pieces inspired by architecture.
Rose lived and worked in scenic Door County, Wisconsin, which he made his home for the majority of his career. His ties to Wisconsin ran deep: the state was the home of his parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents.
The words on the other pages of this website are his own, which he updated a day before his death by suicide.
He is survived by a father, aunt, two sisters, nieces and a nephew, and extended family. His loving family hopes that he has found peace. While the pain of losing the gentle, caring human being that Jim was is intense, the family celebrates the life he lived through the infinite legacy of his artistic brilliance.
Tributes
- Jim Rose’s Timeless Artistic Legacy, The Red Book Stories, Pagoda Red
Selected Collections
Renwick Gallery, Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington, D.C.; Racine Art Museum, Racine, Wisconsin; Mesa Contemporary Arts, Mesa, Arizona; The Museum of Arts and Design, New York, New York; John Michael Kohler Art Center, Sheboygan, Wisconsin; Kohler Company, Kohler, Wisconsin; Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin; Society for Contemporary Craft, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Arkansas Arts Center, Little Rock, Arkansas; Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; Indiana State Museum and Historic Sites, Indianapolis, Indiana; The Chipstone Foundation, Fox Point, Wisconsin; Museum of Wisconsin Art, West Bend, Wisconsin.
Note for the record. Jim’s original website, jimrosefurniture dot com, was never surrendered to Jim by Suzanne Rose during their acrimonious divorce. This is despite a court order that Jim should have sole control of his website. Suzanne demanded an absurd and astronomical ransom for the site, and jealously hung onto it’s control, as she had attempted to control Jim himself. This was a way to marginalize his brilliance and stifle his gentle soul.
Instead of fighting for the website, or paying for its control, he made the decision to abandon that web property and move on.
During Jim’s recovery from his first suicide attempt and after his divorce was final, he and his sister, Anne, purchased a new domain (jimroseartist dot com) and built a new website – it was exactly what you see on this website, less the obvious updates. The new website mirrored the valiant effort Jim made to rebuild his life and his career. He wanted more than anything to be rebranded as “Jim Rose, Artist.” He saw a future free from the narcissistic and controlling environment he was trying to escape. He wanted his artistic endeavors to expand to sculpture, structures, and both 2- and 3-dimensional collage. He was well on his way to imagining a new future as a multi-faceted artist.
After Jim’s death, Suzanne Rose stole the domain jimroseartist dot com.
In response, Anne purchased a new domain and pointed the WordPress site, with the entirety of the content on which she and Jim had collaborated, to the URL jimroseartist.memorial. She added a Memorial Wall, while leaving the rest of the pages as Jim had updated with his final edits.
The dot coms “jimrosefurniture” and “jimroseartist” are no longer related to the final artistic journey of Jim Rose, artist, sculptor, and furniture maker, and to his memory. They have been altered, repointed, and are solely controlled by his ex-wife.
The Instagram account associated with Jim’s original website URL, which was likewise hijacked, is also now controlled by his ex-wife.
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Copyright 2025, Anne Rose, all rights reserved.