"Signaling Light," a new exhibition by artist Jessica Mallios, examines the oblique histories of women lighthouse keepers from America’s Early Republic through the 20th century. Through multi-channel video, photographs, and drawings, Mallios reflects on themes of labor, gender, and technology.

Filmed over five years at lighthouse sites across the United States, the work weaves asynchronous accounts of keepers and diverse landscapes. Exploring acts of homage and historical inflection, the film uses ambient sounds of locations, readings of various writings by women keepers, interviews with next of kin, and with Sally Snowman, the last auxiliary lighthouse keeper in the United States.

Using frottage from lighthouse stair treads, the drawings and darkroom photographs pursue questions about the marks of time and their absence. A process of wayfinding propelled this project. Conceived in a remote fishing village in Iceland in 2020, Mallios set out to connect with a woman lighthouse keeper who was also a weather station reporter. Due to winter weather, ship and road closures, Mallios was unable to reach her. That experience only reinforced a deep curiosity about the experience of this trade, so reliant on the human eye and hand - to communicate, literally, through light to a world near and far.

Inspired by Mallios’ own experiences of caregiving, loss, and motherhood, the project explores parallels between personal histories and larger structures that shape labor, gender, and visibility. "Signaling Light" examines the significance of these iconic beacons and the largely forgotten, fragmented histories of the women who kept them illuminated.

The exhibition will remain on display through March 12.