A Series of Statistical Charts: An immersive installation by Rachel Loischild
From a series of statistical charts illustrating the condition of the descendants of former African slaves now in residence in the United States of America, 1863-1900. Prepared by W.E.B. Du Bois for the Negro Exhibit of the American Section at the Paris Exposition Universelle in 1900 to show the economic and social progress of African Americans since emancipation.
Join us at Parts & Labor on Friday, October 17, for an evening with artist Rachel Loischild, who will present a new immersive installation extending her ongoing project Heirs’ Property.
Beginning at 6pm, visitors are invited to experience Loischild’s fog projection installation, in which historical data becomes light, atmosphere, and moving form. At 7pm, Rachel will lead a walkthrough of the work and share comments on the project.
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Rachel Loischild will present an immersive, sensory expansion of her ongoing project, Heirs’ Property, which documents the systemic loss of 16 million acres of Black-owned land. Where Heirs’ Property traces the physical and legal landscapes of this erasure, this new fog projection installation materializes its historical data, transforming statistical archives into a physical experience.
Using W. E. B. Du Bois’s landmark Data Portraits, which were originally created for the 1900 Paris Exposition to visualize post-reconstruction Black self-determination and land ownership, Loischild transforms and projects these historical charts onto moving fog. In our contemporary data-driven era, information constantly surrounds us, ambient and invisible. By rendering these historic graphics as three-dimensional, atmospheric coordinates, the installation bridges the history of data representation with our modern, data-saturated landscape, making the immaterial tangible.
The resulting works are fluid, shifting dynamically as air moves through the space. The three-dimensional charts, graphs, and maps serve as the only source of light in the exhibition: as viewers move through the darkness, their own breath, body, and presence alter what is visible. Together, the light and mist trace a quiet, solemn landscape of memory, revealing the depth of history and what persists.
Artist Bio
Rachel Loischild is a Boston-based artist and photographer as well as a Massachusetts Cultural Council Fellow in Photography. She holds her MFA in photography from Pratt Institute and her BA in studio art from Clark University. Her work has been widely shown nationally and internationally at galleries and museums, including at the Jounju Photo Festival in Korea, she was also recognized by the Inge Morath Foundation in IM magazine for her photo essay Estate Sales and in Landscape Stories magazine of Italy for her project Drive-in. Her work is held in numerous collections including the Yale University’s Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library and the Canadian based Magenta Foundation for Photography. in addition to the MCC Loischild is a recipient of multiple City of Boston Arts Opportunity grants and the Berkshire Taconic Artist’s Resource Trust ( A.R.T.) Fund Grant.