People gathered Feb. 16 on a windswept stretch of beach on Anna Maria Island to hoist an art installation — 850-feet of brightly colored ribbons tied on twine.
Each of the 29,000 ribbons represents the life of one Floridian who died from COVID-19 since March 2020, installation creator Cathy Tobias said.
“I wanted something physical and tangible,” Tobias said.
She began twisting colored ribbons onto twine in November 2020 as a “cathartic” way to memorialize the lost lives.
“I remember when it was 100 deaths, and then 200,” Tobias said.
And by the time she started tying ribbons, 16,000 Floridians had succumbed to COVID-19.
“I guess it was healing, but kind of painful, too,” Tobias said of her project.
She started tying the ribbons herself, and soon her sister, Judy Tobias, and a half-dozen friends joined in the project.
At first, Tobias didn’t know how the project would be received. But as word spread and positive responses rolled in, she said the hope now is for it to become a traveling exhibit.
And not just an exhibit to be looked at but an interactive one allowing people to write the name of a Floridian who died from COVID-19 on a ribbon.
“Our goal today is to bring the community together to interact with this art installation that is a physical and visual representation of these lives that have been lost to COVID in Florida, and together we can remember them, celebrate them express our grief and find a path to healing together,” Tobias said.
‘We Remember’
As people stepped onto the beach near the Sandbar Restaurant, volunteers handed each a black button-pin that said “We Remember” in bright colors matching the ribbons.
“Thank you, Cathy, for giving us a path to remember, because we’re going to lift up those ribbons, and when we lift up those ribbons, we are lifting up lives … the beauty of life, the preciousness of life and our commitment to remember today, tomorrow and always,” Rabbi Stacy Offner said in a prayer.
Then people walked down the beach to take a place along the string of ribbons that stretched south from the restaurant. Wearing face masks and keeping a social distance, they raised the ribbons at a prompt from Tobias.
While holding a section of ribbons above her head, Ann Hoffman of Bradenton looked skyward and basked in the sun breaking through morning clouds.
The memorial provided an opportunity to honor her brother, Stephen Newlon, also of Bradenton, who on March 30, 2020, became the third known Manatee County resident to succumb to COVID-19.
Newlon was recovering from surgery at the Braden River Rehabilitation Center when a state “safer-at-home” order was enacted, preventing Hoffman from visiting.
He was rushed to the hospital with COVID-19. It took staff two days to inform Hoffman and 12-hours later her brother died.
“It was hard. I never got to see him again, talk to him again,” Hoffman said.
Tobias “has brilliantly put together art and its beauty and magnificence with a tragedy that’s too difficult to articulate, and we need to be able to do something,” Offner said.
Offner said she pastored families who lost loved ones to COVID-19 and has seen people heal from it, too. She was Tobias’ longtime Rabbi at her Minnesota synagogue, Shir Tikvah, which in English translates from Hebrew to “A Song of Hope.”
“Hope keeps us going and putting one step in front of another,” Offner said.