Antonia Rolls

Antonia Rolls is a painter, writer, speaker, creator and offers spiritual and emotional end of life support. She has worked with death and dying since 2009. After the death of her partner in 2007, she created the A Graceful Death exhibition (portraits and words from the end of life) and it was this death that turned her world upside down and showed her what her life's work should be. It was not something that she would ever have expected to do. While working on A Graceful Death, she discovered Felicity Warner, and trained with her to become a soul midwife - a spiritual and emotional end of life companion.

Antonia volunteered for her local hospice for many happy years, mainly as a listener and a maker of tea, soon also becoming a patient companion for those who did not have visitors or family, and were alone. In 2018 she joined Macmillan Cancer Support as a volunteer Buddy, supporting and befriending those who were finding their cancer journey difficult and in 2020, she won the Deborah Hutton Award for the South and East of England, for supporting people affected by cancer.

Antonia now does what she calls "under-the-radar" work, supporting people in person, on the phone or by email in whatever way she can. She is deeply committed to enabling us all to deal with the dyings and deaths around us in our families and communities and runs a listening support group, Loss Conversations, for loss of all kinds and the effect it has on our lives.

Antonia is creative, does not conform and loves a platform. She writes a blog and newsletter twice a month, has a YouTube channel where she creates updates from her studio about what she is doing and what she is thinking, and creates little stories of her world on Facebook and Instagram. Her most recent paintings and exhibition project is on the subject of addiction.

Antonia is the proud mother to one daughter and two sons, and is the delighted owner of four (so far) grandchildren. She loves drinking tea, chatting to friends, sitting on the sofa and planning what to eat next. She loves gardens, plants, flowers, trees and beauty. She loves colour, fun, laughter and wit. And most of all, thanks to the gifts of all those people who have shown her how to die, she loves life.