Covarrubias, Rosa, 1895-1970

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Rosa Rolanda was an American multidisciplinary artist, dancer, and choreographer.

She was born in Azusa, California on September 6, 1895. Her father, Henry Charles Cowan, was an engineer and her mother, Guadalupe Ruelas, was of Mexican descent. Rolanda began her artistic career in New York in 1916 as a celebrated dancer in vaudeville and Broadway revues. She became involved with the Mexican artist Miguel Covarrubias in 1924, and in the following year the couple traveled to Mexico, where Rolanda began to take photographs. Albums of her images were published in Covarrubias's best-selling books, The Island of Bali (1937) and Mexico South: Isthmus of Tehuantepec (1946). Her work was also featured in the "Ameridinian" issue of Wolfgang Paalen's journal, DYN, published in 1943.

During the late 1920s or early 1930s, Rolanda experimented with photograms, creating a series of surrealist self-portraits that may have been influenced by Man Ray, who photographed Rolanda in Paris in 1923. She probably began to paint around 1926, but began to use this medium more frequently from the mid-1930s on. The majority of her canvases depict colorful scenes of children and festivals, portraits of friends (such as the movie actresses Dolores del Río and María Félix), and self-portraits. Rolanda and Covarrubias married in 1930, and by 1935 they had permanently settled into his family home in Tizapan El Alto, close to Mexico City. In 1952 Rolanda exhibited her paintings in a solo show at the Galeria Souza in Mexico City.

By 1952, Miguel Covarrubias had left Rolanda for a relationship with a promising dancer, Rocío Sagaón, who Rolanda had helped to train. Some of Rolanda's works from this period, such as Autorretrato (self-portrait), seem to convey some of the inner turmoils she suffered as a result of this betrayal by her husband.

She died in Mexico City, Mexico on March 25, 1970.

Archival Resources
Role Title Holding Repository
creatorOf Covarrubias, Rosa, d. 1970. Letters to José Limón. New York Public Libraries for the Performing Arts, Dance Collection
creatorOf Covarrubias, Rosa, d. 1970. Scrapbook. New York Public Libraries for the Performing Arts, Dance Collection
referencedIn José Limón and Pauline Lawrence Limón photograph files, 1910?-1972? The New York Public Library. Jerome Robbins Dance Division.
Role Title Holding Repository
Relation Name
spouseOf Covarrubias, Miguel, 1904-1957 person
associatedWith Heppenstall, George. person
associatedWith Limón, José person
Place Name Admin Code Country
New York City NY US
Bali 07 ID
Azusa CA US
Mexico City 09 MX
Subject
Women choreographers
Women dancers
Women painters
Women photographers
Occupation
Choreographer
Dancers
Painters
Photographers
Activity

Person

Birth 1895-09-06

Death 1970-03-25

Female

Americans

English,

Spanish; Castilian

Information

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SNAC ID: 87565015