Every day, Earth observation satellites scan the planet to provide up-to-date information relevant to climate monitoring, crop yield prediction, urban planning, and disaster response, oil ventures, migrations and more. To Oakland-based artist Rachelle Reichert, it is central to her practice to consider the varied implications of viewing the earth in this way.

Rendered in graphite, her drawings are subtly abstracted aerial landscapes playing with the dichotomies of light and dark and geometric and organic form. For Cloud11, Recihert was commissioned to create an original graphite drawing of cloud formations captured by space satellites that adorn the chocolate’s eleven-sided tins.

“To dream is to look up at the clouds and imagine new possibilities. We are experiencing a time where dreams have never been more important. I am so happy to be included in a project that allows space and time for one to keep their head in the clouds. This drawing took weeks of intense focus on a subject that never remains still. I loved the slowness of building up the rich layers of graphite to create this artwork.” – Rachelle Reichert

Rachelle Reichert is a visual artist and art educator based in the San Francisco Bay Area, California. She creates drawings and sculptures to explore social and ecological concerns caused by technology. Rachelle has presented her artwork at the California Climate Change Symposium, the San Francisco State of the Estuary Conference, the American Geophysical Union Meeting and has been granted a Research Ambassadorship from Planet Labs to create anthropocentric climate-related artwork. Her work has been reviewed and published in the San Francisco Chronicle, Make: Magazine, Condé Nast Traveler and New American Paintings and she has completed permanent commissions at the Ritz Mandarin Oriental in Madrid, Spain and Facebook Headquarters in Menlo Park, CA.
Learn more about Rachelle Recihert on her website https://rachellereichert.com/ or follow her on Instagram @rachelle_reichert.

All images courtesy of the artist.