Ero Celia Mihos (Kelly) of Provincetown, MA, passed away peacefully, with her children at her side, on March 15. She was 96. She leaves behind her loving children Theo Poulin, Michaele Cozzi, Peter Cozzi, and Alethea Cozzi; her devoted grandchildren Andrew Czyoski, Brandon Czyoski, and Liam Overmeyer, as well as her great-grandchildren Nathaniel Czyoski and Alexis Czyoski. She also leaves behind her younger sister, Artemis Warburton and her niece, June Lowther and her nephew, Bill Warburton, as well as the spouses and partners of her children and grandchildren. She was predeceased by her youngest sister, Beatrice and her niece Diana Warburton.
Ero was born in 1922 to Theodore Mihos and Celia Varrows, both originally from Greece. Her family established their home and business in New Bedford, MA., where Ero and her sisters would grow up.
Ero's talents, her passion, her tenacity—her strength—would show at a young age. As a young girl, Ero contracted polio. Instead of accepting the doctor's prognosis, her mother massaged her knee and leg daily, and Ero strengthened it through exercise. She skated every day, practicing tirelessly, gaining the strength she was told she would never have. She continued to be physically active her entire life, enjoying swimming, water skiing, horseback riding, skiing, cycling and hiking.
This same passion and determination was displayed in another part of her life—her art. Ero was an artist. In her desire to work to be the best that she could be, Ero attended Vesper George School of Art in Boston and then went on to attend the Art Students League of New York. It was there that she met and later married fellow artist Ciro Cozzi.
In 1950, Ero and Ciro, who now had their first child, Theo, moved to Provincetown. Together they would have three more children and would open Ciro and Sal's restaurant, which quickly became the gathering place for local artists. Raising four children and working in the restaurant (she waited tables and made the desserts, creating the restaurant's famous key lime pie) left little time for pursuing her art. Her creative ability always shone through, however, whether as a talented seamstress (she made all the clothes for herself and her young children), a gardener (she designed and planted the original garden behind the restaurant), and as a cook (her children and friends have wonderful memories of her delicious avoglemono soup and roast leg of lamb).
Ero and Ciro eventually divorced. After re-marrying, Ero and her children moved with her new husband to Longmeadow, MA. Here, once again, her talent shone through in the creation of a beautiful garden and the redesign of their home. She created a specially themed room for each of her children, making the curtains and canopies and upholstering all the furniture herself. From here they soon moved to Rye, N.Y. Here, too, she used her design skills to create a beautiful home and garden. Her children were now older, so Ero began, once again, to pursue her art with a passion. She studied at the State University of New York College at Purchase, the New School for Social Research in New York, and the Westchester County Art Center in White Plains, New York. She learned photography and spent countless hours photographing scenes of people on the beach. These photographs inspired drawings and paintings, both in oils and in watercolor. She attended life-drawing workshops whenever possible, working with pastels, pencil and watercolor. Her work was exhibited at the Artists Equity Association of New York, the State University of New York at Purchase, the Village Gallery in Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y., and the College of New Rochelle in New York.
After the birth of her first grandchild, Ero returned to Provincetown. She would remain on the Cape for the rest of her life and would be an integral part of the lives of all of her grandchildren and great grandchildren. She devoted much of her time and love to them, but she did not put aside her art to do so. She was always sketching out ideas, writing notes about pieces and themes she wanted to develop, trying new techniques. She loved photographing her grandchildren and other local children as they played. She developed these photographs herself and exhibited them, both on their own and as central themes of her collages. She continued to be physically active, too, swimming every day in the summer and walking the beaches year-round. On these walks she would find pottery shards, animal and fish bones, feathers, drift wood, and all manner of detritus that had washed ashore. She used these found objects in her art, developing her own unique techniques to create constructions with them. She exhibited her photographs, collages, paintings, drawings, and constructions at galleries across the Cape (East End Gallery, Higgins Gallery, New East End Gallery, Packard Gallery, Provincetown Group Gallery, Creative Arts Center, Cape Cod Art Association, and the Provincetown Art Association and Museum), receiving awards and praise for her talent. Ero continued to work into her mid-80's and leaves behind a large and varied body of work, much of which has never been exhibited.
Ero Mihos was an artist, and she was a loving and devoted mother/grandmother/great grandmother. Her passing is a great loss to us all. We will miss her terribly but will be forever grateful to have had her in our lives.
Ero will be laid to rest in a private ceremony at the First Congregational Parish Cemetery in Truro. In lieu of flowers, her family asks that donations be made in her name to the Truro Center for the Arts Castle Hill, with the donations going to the Center's student scholarship program. Donations can be made on-line at castlehill.org or by check to Truro Center for the Arts Castle Hill, P.O. Box 756, Truro, MA 02666.