Art shows and exhibitions are traditionally hosted at Gallery 120’s brick-and-mortar location in the atrium of the Fine Arts building on the Inver Hills campus in Inver Grove Heights, Minnesota.
Rose was raised in an environment infused with art. Her mom, Lisa, is a freelance illustrator who has completed work for Disney park guides and medical textbooks. Lisa is also a professional tarot card reader.
“I’ve done art for as long as I can remember,” Rose related. “Art was everywhere when I was growing up.”
Click image below to watch a video of Rose Cooper’s AFA Exhibition:
My favorite subjects to work with are portraits and landscapes. Landscapes because of my love for nature. Then portraits because it’s one of the more difficult subjects to recreate and I enjoy that challenging aspect.
My biggest influence and inspirations would be nature, finding light in the darkness, time, illumination, and a person at the center of all these themes. Seeing a light at the end of the tunnel is one of my favorite themes to incorporate in my work. To me, it represents how the trials and turbulences of life are not a permanent state, and things will get better in time.
In addition to this, showing how there is a connection between humans and nature, and how there is beauty in the earth. One of the biggest reoccurring themes I continue to use is a person and, in some way, or another they are tied to nature and the relationship between the two elements is something I like to explore in different ways.
For me, the relationship between the two subjects represents harmony, but at the same time I also explore a sense of darkness between the two. To ask the viewer: what is their own relationship to nature like?
Thought ultimately, I think my biggest belief in my work is to capture a sense of longing in it, whether this is a literal sense where the subject is in obvious distress or a more subtle sense. Then in turn try to bring that feeling of longing out of the viewer. It’s not a longing for any theme in particular, but I find it to be a very powerful emotion and the power in that is something I want to capture and represent in my work.
Rose Cooper, AFA Exhibition gallery
Untitled, 20 x 15 inches, Acrylic on Canvas, 2021
Tell Me A Story, 20 x 15 inches, Acrylic on Canvas, 2019
In The Grass, 18 x 24 inches, Acrylic on Canvas, 2019
Untitled, 20 x 15 inches, Acrylic on Canvas, 2019
Artist bio
I’m a second-generation artist. I was raised in Wisconsin, but currently living in Minneapolis, Minnesota. When I’m not painting or in school, I work part-time as an art teacher. My other hobbies include: hiking, camping, concerts, Brazilian jiu-jitsu and writing. I also have a cat named Luna, nicknamed Lunatic for her hyperactive personality.
Rose Cooper
Learn more about Rose Cooper by reading her Inver Hills News story:
