Mona Chalabi: Squeeze

Data journalist, illustrator and writer Mona Chalabi presents a large-scale exhibition on the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis’ Project Wall.

Chalabi’s work is informed by statistics gathered on politics, human rights, demographics, COVID-19 infections, climate change and many other topics. Finding truth in numbers through journalism, she makes that truth easier to digest with illustrations. “My job is to take a story, zoom out and provide context for readers,” Chalabi says. “The thing that excites me about data is the scale of it. Data gives you a new frame of understanding.”

For her exhibition at CAM, Chalabi focuses on endangered species of plants and animals, some of which are so close to extinction that every remaining member can fit on a New York subway car – if they squeeze.