Jessica Singerman: Cloud Girl Accidentally Eats Rainbow
Jessica Singerman: Cloud Girl Accidentally Eats Rainbow
Sawtooth School for Visual Art
Davis Gallery
April 21 – July 12, 2025
Opening Reception: April 17, 6 – 8pm
Cloud Girl Accidentally Eats Rainbow features video, collage, drawing, and textile installation works that explore our relationship to the ephemeral and ever-shifting natural world.
***
Join us for two complementary hands-on workshops with the artist before the show opens to create fabric boulders for the exhibition. These workshops are open to all and offered free of charge, courtesy of Sawtooth and supporting community partners.
Tuesday, April 8 • 7-9 pm (RSVP here)
Wednesday, April 9 • 10 am – 12 pm (RSVP here)
***
Through textiles, drawing, video, and collage, Cloud Girl Accidentally Eats Rainbow explores distinctions of permanence and impermanence, as well as the delicate balance between chaos and order. Known for abstract paintings that reference the landscape, Cloud Girl marks a departure from Singerman’s usual ways of working, a new direction that evolved from ongoing contemplation, play, and concern.
Singerman’s work exists in tension, incorporating elements both light and heavy, ephemeral and enduring. In the central installation, soft shapes and naturally dyed fabric will suspend from the ceiling, reminiscent of laundry on a line or flags in the wind, while tightly bundled masses, or “boulders,” will sit heavy on the ground. With recent climate disasters spurring reflection and introspection, Singerman’s work reflects on textile’s roles in our ecosystem. “On a large scale,” she says, “it’s an industry of extraction and exploitation. Yet on a small scale, it can be one of care, craft, and resistance.”
Singerman’s video work examines technology’s pervasiveness and social media’s impact on our outdoor experiences. The artist asks viewers to consider: How can we enjoy nature unmediated when social media’s filtered images dominate our view, driven by profit? What are the consequences of prioritizing performance for strangers over personal growth? Other drawings, collages, and ephemeral installations by the artist reflect the same concerns.
“My connection to the land is both personal and professional,” said Singerman. “As an outdoor athlete and as a former guide leading people across continents by bike and foot, I have seen firsthand how landscapes shape us and how we, in turn, alter them.”
“As a painter, my work is motivated by the outdoor experience. Because painting is inherently a two–dimensional experience, this exhibition–with installations, sculptures, and more–offer a way to create a more immersive and interconnected experience for viewers.”
Singerman has also documented her processes in crafting this exhibition on her website, at https://jessicasingerman.com/blog/
***
Before the exhibition, Sawtooth will host complimentary workshops where participants can create art and learn fiber techniques. Singerman will guide all ages in binding scrap fabric into colorful sculptures called “boulders.” The event fosters community making, conversations with the artist, and reflections on fabric waste. Community-created pieces will be displayed in the exhibition, with all participants acknowledged. Registration required; details below.
Interactive elements are also included in the exhibition itself, including an installation of hand-folded paper cranes that visitors are invited to take with them. “I hope visitors take this memento from the exhibition to reflect on their appreciation of the environment and their role in preserving it,” said Jessica Singerman.
