Luckiest Little Freak

Summertime is delighted to present Luckiest Little Freak, the first solo exhibition by artist in residence Emma Singer, whose soft sculptures combine the traditional practice of quilting with puppetry’s spirit of improvisation and play. “I’m drawn to fabric because I love love love to make art to be touched and held and felt!” Emma said. “My first question with most art is: can I touch?” 

Loooong gangly arms cavort with clown quilts and an eight foot foot in Emma’s soft circus. Stuffed hands reach out, yearning to be held, and a fringe-guarded portal beckons you into another world - one that’s gentler, sillier, silkier, freakier. 

“I’m in deep admiration of freaky freak shit,” Emma said. Since becoming disabled, Emma has been drawn to the history of the freak show as a site of disability performance. “Disabled people could look their audience in the eyes and be perceived in their full humanity, in a society often selling our bodies as inhuman.” 

Unflinching eye contact and other tools of connection are threaded throughout Emma’s work: in the little strings that merge two scraps of found fabric, and the soft velvet-laden postcards she made healing in isolation, yearning for community. There’s also plenty of unabashed delight, as in the pair of naked legs dancing wildly in the breeze, inspired by the dancing tube men often posted up outside car dealerships. 

The star of Emma’s show is the archetype of Pierrot, the crying clown, who dwells in the grief and the silliness at once. “Finding levity and whimsy in the hard moments,” Emma said. “In my little life, that’s been essential.” What started for Emma as a survival tactic has blossomed into a creative way of being, where pain rips open portals to beauty and play. 

In the quilted soft sculpture Luckiest Little Freak, a wide-eyed clown in a lilac bob peeks out from behind their oversized ruffle collar. A strip of rainbow fabric moves up through the clown’s hands and into their heart — thanks to the engineering support of Jeff Pelz, Emma’s girlfriend’s Dad. “It’s hard to represent taking in the whole world through your heart,” Emma said. “Everything has a little life in it.” 

To get into the clown spirit during her Summertime residency, Emma participated in a workshop with iconic clown Alex Tartarsky and five of her friends. Alex – a performance artist whose media include humiliation and possession – invited the baby clowns to babble from their loins and interact as fiery flames who are co-workers. The biggest challenge was lingering in a state of vulnerability and potential transformation without hiding. 

Cradled in community, Emma felt safe to truly play, “weaving the little energies” of her collaborators in with her own. Emma’s show mirrors this feeling — of being wrapped up in gentleness and getting absurd as a result. To a clown, the intense and tumultuous feelings evoked carve out a cozy little pit in which to linger, luxuriate, and get weird. Emma makes this space physical.

Emma will transform Summertime into a cirque-de-cocoon of freaky friendship, a gentle circus you can ogle, touch, connect with, and rest within. A gauzy circus tent meets canopy bed will embrace viewers from above, while uncanny quilts and stuffed body parts invite them into the soft mushy emotional places that aren’t so easy to define. The pastel palette acts as sugary sweet frosting covering up the blood and guts that comprise our internal worlds, while winking at what’s inside. Emma also created a series of one-of-a-kind bloomers to adorn the little clown within you, waiting to be awakened. The exhibition will inspire you to be a freak in the sheets, or better yet the quilts. 

Join Emma and her little clown on July 10 for the opening of Luckiest Little Freak, featuring chartreuse cotton candy, limeade, chocolate chip cookies (made by Emma’s mom), and clown face paint for all who chose to revel. You are invited to touch the art, ever so gently.