Our friend and colleague Ann Rippin died recently, leaving our community bleaker and less vibrant for her passing. Ann was a former Chair of the Standing Conference on Organizational Symbolism (SCOS) and editor of our Culture and Organization journal. Her unbound creativity, crafting talent, and kindness inspired scholars at all career stages – more than she would have ever taken credit for. Her artist work, impeccable handwriting, and contagious passion for beauty, left a mark on many people outside of academia. Her trailblazing research combining arts-based methods, sensitivity, and intellectual challenge remains a beacon in our field, igniting hope for originality, affect and embodiment in management and organization studies, and inviting us to be daring and embrace art, beauty and reflexivity in our work. Her great performative presentations, and her wondrous work on textile, patchwork, embroidery and colour, made her conferences talks and events hard to miss. We will continue to weave her threads in our work, inspired by her eloquence, creativity, kindness and sense of humour. Many of us treasure colourful artefacts, embroidered gifts, and tokens of her thoughtfulness, reminding us of her vibrancy, impeccable sense of style, and warmth.
She was an excellent teacher – within and outside of the classroom – and a caring colleague, who will be dearly missed. Our heartfelt sympathy goes out to Peter Fleming, her husband who often joined our SCOS community and events together with Ann, her friends and colleagues worldwide.