By Janelle Gelfand
The Cincinnati Enquirer

Poet and artist Annie Ruth of Roselawn somehow finds time to teach and mentor children. (Steven M. Herppich photo) | ZOOM |

It started with a phone call in the middle of the night.

"Your sister's house is on fire."

Annie Ruth ran - ran - all the way from short Vine, where she was living while attending the University of Cincinnati, to Walnut Hills, where her older sister lived with her two small children.

"I physically ran from my house, down McMillan, through Peebles Corner," she says. " I didn't know which child was hurt - they wouldn't take me to the ambulance."

Her 4-year-old nephew had died in the fire.

"I was faced at age 19 with helping my sister plan a funeral," Annie Ruth says. "When he passed away, it opened up those heart strings, and it began to pour out. It's really been pouring out since then."

That tragedy in 1982 was the catalyst that started her poetry flowing. But - poet, visual artist, musician, teacher, mentor, community activist, motivational speaker - it's hard to put Annie Ruth in a category.

"I describe myself as a multifaceted artist," says Annie Ruth (who dropped her last name, Napier, in 1992). She is this year's Duncanson Artist-in-Residence at the Taft Museum, and kicks off her residency with a performance on Saturday.

Named for Robert S. Duncanson (1821-1872), the African-American painter of the murals at the Taft Museum, the artist-in-residence program recognizes outstanding African-Americans in all fields of artistic endeavor.

Quiet workplace

On a recent warm fall day, sun streams through the windows of Annie Ruth's neat Cape Cod, where she lives with her husband, Gerald, and their two children on a quiet, leafy cul-de-sac in Roselawn.

Surrounded by brilliantly colored paintings in her study, she bends over a large canvas on the floor, "The Blues," touching up a detail. Yolanda Adams soaring gospel blares from her boom box.

ABOUT ANNIE RUTH

Born: Cincinnati, Sept. 5, 1963 Family: Gerald Napier, husband; children, Cameron, 15; Gerian, 11 Grew up: College Hill; Aiken High School grad, 1981 Education: Attended University of Cincinnati; Bachelor of Arts degree in art and business from National University, San Diego Armed services: United States Air Force Reserves, 1982-90 Favorite singer: Yolanda Adams Favorite band: "My son and nephew have a band called Young People for Christ. They play gospel, jazz and classical." Reds or Bengals? Bengals Gold Star or Skyline? "Oh, I've got to pick one? Skyline." Favorite Graeter's flavor: Vanilla Role models: Nikki Giovanni, Maya Angelou, Langston Hughes and Gwendolyn Brooks "In terms of personal role models, I have to go back to my mom. Even though life was difficult for her and she might have broken down, she never quit. So I think it's that drive, of seeing her never giving up on herself, always pushing forward." Best childhood memory: "My family, when we were together, sharing the simple things: A ride on my father's back, Mama's singing beautiful songs to me, baking sweet potato pies, drawing (pictures) in our family's encyclopedia set."

DUNCANSON EVENTS

Saturday - Annie Ruth performs with kids 4-21 who are members of Writers of Outstanding Words, 2-4 p.m., Barnes & Noble Booksellers, Newport on the Levee. Sunday - Book and CD signing, 7-9 p.m., Joseph-Beth Booksellers, Rookwood Pavilion, 2692 Madison Road, Norwood. Next Thursday - Soul of a Sister, a performance of spoken word, poetry and song. 7:30 p.m., Memorial Hall, Over-the-Rhine. Nov. 15 - Travel with Annie Ruth into a world called "imagination" by using poetry and words to inspire your artistic creations. For children aged 5-10 accompanied by an adult. 10 a.m.-noon, Arts Consortium, 1515 Linn St., West End. Free, reservations required. Information: 241-0343, Ext. 28.

ROBERT S. DUNCANSON

Robert S. Duncanson (1821-1872) was one of America's most prominent African-American artists. He is remembered for his Hudson River School style of landscape painting, his still lifes and murals. He was born in upstate New York, educated in Canada and moved to Cincinnati in 1841. Cincinnati arts patron Nicholas Longworth (1782-1863) commissioned eight murals for his residence (now the Taft Museum of Art), resulting in one of the largest existing pre-Civil War domestic mural decorations in the nation.

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"I like getting my work done when the kids are in school; I don't have to worry about disturbing anyone," she says, explaining the music.

She's the author and illustrator of five volumes of poetry, a collection of inspirational narratives and two children's books. In 1986, her book of poems, Sing Out for the Reader Who Loves to Explore Life, was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in Arts and Letters.

She's also a fulltime performance artist, who creates educational projects for schools and gives inspirational workshops throughout the community, through her own company, A. Ruth Creations.

She still finds time to mentor young people; she's a child advocate who has worked with abused children, both as a former staff member and a volunteer for ProKids. For her Memorial Hall concert next Thursday she will present poetry, song and drama based on her CD, Soul of a Sister. It includes "No You're Not," inspired by a 9-year-old girl she helped, who suffered from low self-esteem.

"I knew her advocacy work well before I knew her art," says Tracy Cook, executive director of ProKids. "It's so unusual to find someone who is as professional, organized and just together - very detail-oriented, and business-minded - and then to find out that she's this amazing artist. It was just, frankly, shocking."

Annie Ruth is a risk-taker. A pacesetter. She never stops going. She's a lot like Tammy Coleman Black, the main character of her book, Reflection, a collection of "straight talk and inspirational narratives." Actually, she admits, she is that character. Her personal story is the testimony she shares with others.

When she gives an impromptu performance of "Ghetto Woman," a rap poem with a message to young women, she becomes animated; she crouches, grimaces, reaches for the sky and feels each word. You are drawn in as much by her powerful persona, as by the beat.

She shares her story, she says, to "shed light on the things that no one wants to really look at, to lift up hung-down heads, and to be that voice for those who can't speak for themselves."

She has her "work clothes" on: red T-shirt and black jeans. She wears no makeup and has a dazzling smile, framed like a child's sunshine picture by spiky short locks.

Her art is a colorful palette aimed at children - like the murals she created for Central Clinic, University of Cincinnati Medical Center in Corryville, unveiled in September.

"The colors are just fantastic," says Dr. Charles W. Collins, clinical director of the child and family treatment center. "About 65 percent of our children in our clinic are African-American. (Annie Ruth) was able to come up with some beautiful designs that capture the children, and use them in positive situations. The children stare at them; they actually identify with the children in the murals."

"Direct innocence" is how Cincinnati artist Brian Joiner describes Annie Ruth's work.

"It hits home: it's simple and engaging, it's direct," he says. "She has a gift for working with children. Annie Ruth epitomizes the whole idea of valuing our younger generation.

"To come from where she was, and to excel in an environment that wasn't conducive, is amazing. Art opens up dialogue for so many things, no matter what station in life you are."

Growing up, Annie Ruth was like that 9-year-old girl with low self-esteem. Her father, an alcoholic, abandoned her mother and older sister when Annie Ruth was in third grade. She was taunted at school for her dark skin color. Her mother suffered from mental illness.

"Going to school, after the income changes - wearing the hand-me-downs, the darkness of my skin, a lot of teasing from my peers, coupled with the absence of my father - made me feel that, wow, maybe I wasn't good enough," Annie Ruth says.

Although she dreamed of becoming a doctor so she could "cure" her mother, Annie Ruth was never without paper and crayons. It was her escape. She noticed her pictures lifted her mother's spirits.

"Growing up, you're taught, you don't talk about what's going on in your home. So even though you're living in hell, you dare not tell anyone else," she says.

When Annie Ruth was in ninth grade, her mother suffered a breakdown, and she and her older sister were split up. Annie Ruth went to live with her father, then in Fairmount. They moved to Atlanta.

"His value structure was so different from what my mom raised me with. I actually became a teen runaway," she says.

She got up very early one day, and packed all her possessions in two giant suitcases.

"When I left for school that morning, I carried them down the street," she says.

It took guts, but Annie Ruth wasn't a typical runaway.

"I knew where I was going," she says.

She was going home to Cincinnati, to live with her mom in the West End. She knew her mother couldn't care for her; Annie Ruth was prepared to take care of herself.

Destined to draw

Medicine was still in the back of her mind, but deep down, she knew she needed to draw. She enrolled in Aiken High School. It had a good commercial art program that would offer her a better shot at finding her dream.

Her mother encouraged her.

"She told me, no matter how hard it gets, no matter what we don't have - you have the strength and the power within you to do anything you want to do," Annie Ruth recalls.

That gave her the courage to persevere. She worked hard. Her teachers, realizing her talent, helped her with art supplies.

"My mom couldn't afford to pay for it. And they did it in such a respectable way where you didn't feel like, oh, I'm a hand-me-down kind of case," Annie Ruth says. She excelled in school.

"There are people out there who will help you, but you have to have a mind to help yourself. It wasn't always easy and people didn't hand me things on a silver platter, but you could do it, if you really wanted to."

After school, she waited tables at Frisch's. The tips were great - but Annie Ruth had higher aspirations. A teacher told her about a printer in Northside who might give her a job in a work-study program.

"So I got together my portfolio, knocked on the door, arranged an interview, and persuaded them that they should hire me as a layout artist assistant," Annie Ruth says. She clinched the deal by saying they wouldn't have to pay her the first few years.

"She was creating designs, logos and letterheads for customers," recalls Sam Thomas, who gave Annie Ruth her first job. "She put 100 percent into everything, no matter what job it was. She was always a team player. If you told her to do something, she'd do the job, and she'd have some ideas of her own, and come back later with, 'These are some other ideas I came up with.'

"She was a workaholic."

Thomas says that now his most prized possessions are her artwork on his walls.

Glowing recommendations helped Annie Ruth get a scholarship to the University of Cincinnati. But even with a scholarship, she needed money to live.

So she joined the Air Force Reserves.

"I was a graphic designer in the Air Force Reserves at Wright-Patterson Air Force base. When my husband and I relocated to California - he was in the Marine Corps - I was on March Air Force base (in Riverside, Calif.)," she says.

"We have been married 20 years. We have the same birthday. I met her in my math class at Aiken," says Gerald Napier, who is as calm and solid as Annie Ruth is a tornado.

"Even back then, she was on the softball team, played basketball and was very active in sports. Wow!" he says, shaking his head.

They married a year after high school graduation, but waited five years to start a family. Annie Ruth wanted to finish her education. Their living room mantel is crammed with family pictures, and "honor student" trophies belonging to their children.

"When our son was born, he had some complications during birth. It was a difficult experience, being a new father, and emotional," Napier says. "But Annie played a major role in helping me to get through that time, because of her caring, her strength."

Surrounded by art

Nearly every available wall space in their home is graced by Annie Ruth's art. His pride and joy is an early piece, "The Gathering," which he hung over his desk.

"It's amazing. Every time she does a project, I always ask if I can have it. I don't think there's a piece that she has done that I don't like," he says.

When she isn't painting, Annie Ruth records her thoughts in an "idea file." She often wakes up in the middle of the night, and races to write down her dreams.

Music is always running through her head. (She wrote the song, "My Sister, My Friend," sitting in her bathtub.)

Quietly spiritual, she knows she will always have her faith to fall back on.

"When I faced some of life's greatest tragedies and obstacles in my life, knowing that if I can't write about, if I can't talk about it, if I can't sing about it, or if I can't paint about it, no matter where I am, I can always talk to God about it.

"I'm like this empty cup, that this inspiration pours through. ... We all are creative; we all are spiritual beings. And the connection into what's being poured into me, allows me to pour it out to the rest of the world."

E-mail jgelfand@enquirer.com