Sibylle Szaggars Redford is a German-born multimedia environmental artist best known for turning rainfall itself into part of her creative process and for developing The Way of the Rain, a performance project combining visual art, film, music, dance, light and spoken word. The U.S. State Department’s Art in Embassies program identifies her as a multimedia environmental artist and documents the development of her rain-based work.
She is also the widow of actor and filmmaker Robert Redford, whom she married in Hamburg in 2009. Redford died on September 16, 2025. As of August 26, 2026, Szaggars Redford remains listed as Founder, President and Artistic Director of The Way of the Rain, while her Santa Fe fine-art gallery also continues to operate.
Key takeaways
- Sibylle Szaggars Redford is a German-born environmental artist whose documented work includes watercolor, film and multidisciplinary performance.
- Her Rainfall series began in 2010, when she allowed New Mexico monsoon rain to alter prepared watercolor works.
- That process developed into The Way of the Rain, first staged in 2013 and presented as a live multidisciplinary performance at the 2015 Sundance Film Festival.
- She married Robert Redford in 2009 and remained married to him until his death in September 2025.
- In 2026, she remains professionally active through The Way of the Rain and her Santa Fe gallery.
Sibylle Szaggars profile summary
| Detail | Verified information |
|---|---|
| Full public name | Sibylle Szaggars Redford |
| Profession | Multimedia environmental artist |
| Known for | Rain/Rainfall works and The Way of the Rain |
| Organization | The Way of the Rain, Inc. |
| Current role | Founder, President & Artistic Director, as of August 26, 2026 |
| Gallery | Sibylle Szaggars Redford Fine Art in Santa Fe |
| Spouse | Robert Redford, married in 2009 until his death in 2025 |
How rain became part of her art
Szaggars Redford’s best-documented artistic turning point came in 2010. According to the State Department, she began a Rainfall series that summer, allowing weather to participate directly in the making of the work rather than treating nature only as a subject.
In a 2021 interview with the Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation, she described preparing watercolor on dry paper and then exposing it to New Mexico’s monsoon rain so that falling water would change the pigments and surface. “Nature always has been my inspiration as an Artist,” she said.
That method helps explain the distinctive direction her career took afterward. Rain was no longer simply something to represent in a painting; it became part of the physical process that produced the image.
Her earlier documented work included Shape of Color, a collaboration with cellist Nina Kotova that the State Department says was presented in Cortona, Italy, in 2008 and later in Singapore. But the rain paintings became the clearer foundation for the multidisciplinary work that would define the next stage of her career.
From Rain Paintings to The Way of the Rain
By 2013, Szaggars Redford had expanded the idea beyond watercolor. The State Department records that she developed The Way of the Rain with composer David Thor Jonsson and staged its first performance in Albuquerque that year.
The project combined visual art with music, sound, film, dance, lighting and spoken word. A site-specific version followed through the National YoungArts Foundation in Miami in 2014.
In 2015, the project reached one of its most visible early stages when Sundance included it in the festival’s special programming. Sundance’s original program announcement described The Way of the Rain as a live multidisciplinary performance and credited Szaggars Redford as creative director.
That distinction matters because later biographies sometimes describe the project simply as a Sundance “Official Selection,” language that can make it sound like a conventional competition film. It was instead presented as a live performance work.
Later in 2015, Szaggars Redford founded The Way of the Rain, Inc., extending the project into a formal nonprofit organization. Her own account of its development emphasizes collaboration: video artist Floyd Thomas McBee contributed to the rain-film work, Jonsson was involved in its earlier musical development, and composer Tim Janis became an important collaborator in later productions.
The State Department commission in Suriname
Another documented milestone came through the U.S. State Department’s Art in Embassies program.
In 2016, Szaggars Redford received a commission connected with the new permanent collection at the U.S. Embassy in Paramaribo, Suriname. The official State Department record describes work created from her rain-painting process, and its Paramaribo permanent-collection page lists five Way of the Rain works derived from original Rain Paintings made in Suriname.
That government record is more precise than some later biographical material, which has described her as an Art in Embassies “award” recipient or claimed that 10 pieces entered the permanent display. The official record supports describing the project as a commission and documents five listed works.
Later performances and environmental work
The Way of the Rain continued to evolve after its early Sundance presentation.
Szaggars Redford has said that a collaboration with Tim Janis contributed to the development of Voices of Hope, which her own account places at Carnegie Hall in December 2017. Because an independent Carnegie Hall archive record was not established in the available research, that particular venue detail is best understood as a first-party account rather than an independently confirmed milestone.
A more firmly documented event followed in 2018, when Brushwood Center jointly honored Sibylle Szaggars Redford and Robert Redford with its Distinguished Environmental Leadership Award. The organization also presented the Chicago-area premiere of Voices of Hope.
In 2019, Earth Movements was staged at Eccles Theater in Salt Lake City, with participants connected to Ballet West and the Utah Symphony. The project continued to change form while keeping its environmental theme and collaborative structure.
A later version, The Way of the Rain – Hope for Earth, was presented in Monaco in 2021. On October 22, 2022, the Dallas Symphony documented the U.S. premiere of Hope for Earth at the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center.
The work was still circulating years later. Sustainability Research & Innovation Congress scheduled a Chicago screening in June 2025, and the University of Illinois included Hope for Earth in its Earth Day programming on April 22, 2026.
These later screenings do not by themselves establish that Szaggars Redford personally attended each event, but they do show that the project remained in public and institutional circulation.
Her relationship with Robert Redford
Szaggars Redford’s marriage to Robert Redford is an important part of her public biography, but it came after she had already established an artistic life of her own.
People has reported that the pair met at Sundance Mountain Resort in Utah in 1996, drawing on a later YoungArts discussion in which they spoke about the beginning of their relationship. The meeting date is therefore best treated as reported rather than as a matter of public record.
Their marriage is more firmly documented. A contemporary Associated Press report carried by CBS confirmed that they married in Hamburg in July 2009, with a representative of St. Catherine Church confirming the ceremony.
They did not have children together, according to reputable secondary reporting. That is narrower than saying Szaggars Redford has never had children, a broader claim that is not established by the available record.
Robert Redford died on September 16, 2025, at age 89. The Associated Press report on his death identified Szaggars as his most recent spouse. She should therefore now be described as his widow rather than, as some older pages still do, his current wife.
What is known about her early life?
Szaggars Redford was born in Hamburg, Germany, in 1957, according to multiple secondary biographical sources.
Her exact birthday is less certain. An updated People profile gives April 9, 1957, while an older version of the same publication’s biography, later syndicated by Yahoo, gave April 14. Contemporary 2009 wedding coverage also reported an age that does not fit neatly with either date.
For that reason, the year 1957 is the safer biographical detail to use without presenting a specific day and month as settled fact.
The timing of her move to the United States is similarly inconsistent across published accounts. Some secondary coverage places it in the late 1980s, while State Department material and contemporary Associated Press reporting point to the 1990s. What can be stated more securely is that by the 1990s she had established an artistic practice in Sundance, Utah.
A reliably documented formal degree or art-school qualification has not emerged from the public record used for this profile, so claims about specific educational credentials should be treated cautiously.
Her Santa Fe gallery and current work
A newer chapter in Szaggars Redford’s professional life began with the establishment of Sibylle Szaggars Redford Fine Art in Santa Fe.
Her official gallery site records a private opening on May 19, 2023, followed by a public opening. The gallery presents her own work but has also become a venue for other artists.
That distinction is important when describing her most recent activity. In August 2026, Santa Fe Railyard listed an exhibition opening at the gallery featuring Zuni artists Troy Sice and Ray Tsalate. The event confirms that the gallery remains active, but it was not a new Szaggars Redford solo exhibition.
At the same time, The Way of the Rain continues to list her as Founder, President and Artistic Director. As of August 26, 2026, that remains the clearest verified statement of her current organizational role.
Her continuing public relevance therefore rests on more than her marriage to Robert Redford. She remains attached to an active environmental-arts organization, operates a gallery in Santa Fe and has a body of performance work that was still being screened by cultural and academic institutions in 2026.
Conclusion
Sibylle Szaggars Redford’s public career is most clearly understood through the evolution of her environmental art: from watercolor works altered by monsoon rain to performances in which visual art, music, film, dance and spoken word share the stage. That progression produced The Way of the Rain, a project that has been presented at Sundance and by cultural institutions in the United States and abroad.
Her marriage to Robert Redford brought her wider public recognition, but it is only one part of the record. As of August 2026, Szaggars Redford remains active through The Way of the Rain and her Santa Fe gallery, while her rain-based work continues to provide the clearest through-line in a career built around the interaction between art and the natural world.