Ian McCartor

Ian McCartor, RN, Artist, and Founder of The Ash Rose Project Ian McCartor is a hospice nurse, artist, and founder of The Ash Rose Project, a creative practice that helps individuals and families transform the ashes of loved ones into fine art as a way of healing, remembrance, and renewal. Drawing from over a decade in hospice care, Ian has witnessed firsthand the depth of love, regret, and transformation that accompany life’s final chapters. His work bridges medicine, art, and spirituality - offering people new ways to connect with the memory of those they’ve lost and to carry forward the lessons they left behind. Through The Ash Rose Project, Ian has worked with a wide range of participants, including those grieving spouses, children, parents, grandparents, and dear friends. His approach emphasizes that grief is not a problem to solve, but a relationship to tend - a sacred continuation of love in a new form. The project became deeply personal for Ian after the death of one of his closest friends - the nurse who first hired him and guided him early in his career. Creating her portrait with her ashes, and working alongside her three children through the process, deepened his understanding of how creativity can serve as a bridge between pain and peace. Today, Ian shares his work through art, writing, and speaking, helping others rediscover meaning through remembrance. He believes that in every act of love, even after loss, there is the potential for something new to bloom.

Articles:

The Ash Rose Grief, Art, and Love that Transforms

In our culture, grief is often something we are expected to move through quietly and efficiently. After the funeral, after the condolences fade, families are handed the ashes of someone they love and then left largely on their own to figure out what healing looks like. There is an unspoken expectation of “closure,” as if love ends where a life does. But what if grief is not something to close, but something to continue? I came to this question through two worlds that have shaped my life – hospice nursing and the arts. As a hospice nurse, I have sat […]

Read More