Download PDF Version Revolt Magazine, Volume 1 Issue No.4

acquired it and covered all restoration costs. Once
again, The Rose was lowered through a window by
crane onto a flatbed truck, taken to a warehouse
for cleaning, where its air pockets were filled with
epoxy mixed with chopped fiberglass. 1500 pounds
heavier, it was shipped to New York City for the
Beat Culture exhibition, thirty one years after its
eviction from Fillmore street. The public could now
experience The Rose as DeFeo had envisioned it. It
was no longer an art world rumor.
A color reproduction of The Rose landed on the
cover of the March 1996 issue of Art in America.
Bill Berkson’s article, In the Heat of The Rose,
was featured. The Rose traveled to the Walker Art
Center in Minneapolis, the M.H. de Young Memorial
Museum in San Francisco and the Berkeley Art
Museum. The Whitney Museum included The Rose
in its 1999 exhibition, The American Century: Art &
Culture 1900-2000, Part II and in the 2003 Beside
“The Rose”: Selected Works by Jay DeFeo (October
2, 2003 - February 29, 2004.)
Shortly before Jay DeFeo died, she shared this with
Leah Levy: “She is walking through a museum in
her dream, but she is not Jay DeFeo anymore. It
is in a future life, and she has been born again, as
someone else. She wanders through the galleries,
room after room, and comes upon The Rose -
unearthed, unwrapped, repaired. A person is
standing in front of it, studying it intensely. DeFeo
nudges this person and says, “You know, I did
that.”
Courtesy the Conner Family Trust (c) Conner Family Trust.
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