The title of the painting is inspired by American writer Gertrude Stein’s poem, “Sacred Emily” in which appears the line, “A rose is a rose is a rose is a rose.” In this painting, a warm light bulb on the left releases the rose’s essence. The essence gets distilled into a glass container. The essence then gets extracted and separated into fragrant, acid, rancid and burnt, with the majority of the essence being fragrant. The background text is from a 1940s edition of an encyclopedia entry about Pliny, the ancient botanist and philosopher. The map fragments come from the state of Louisiana to reflect the LGBTQ rights movement which became the Gertrude Stein Society.

Acrylic on canvas

Size: 24 x 36 x 1½ inches

Price: $2300