Exciting News!

Experience Black Quantum Futurism’s Immersive Art Installation at the Hatfield House

by Melissa Romero on July 9, 2021

We are excited to announce that beginning August 14, the historic Hatfield House in East Fairmount Park will be home to the immersive art installation Ancestors returning again / this time only to themselves by Black Quantum Futurism (BQF).

The site-specific art installation debuts BQF’s film Write No History (2021), presented as a video and sound installation inside the Hatfield House. Write No History features found and archival footage of The Temporal Disruptors, members of an ancient secret society of Black scientists, healers, and writers transporting a “quantum time capsule” between the future, past, and present. The Hatfield House is transformed into a gallery of artifacts and found objects from the secret society.

Visitors will walk through the house for a multi-layered experience combining video, sound, and physical objects.

“As longtime neighborhood residents, the presence of the Hatfield House has always been monumental and mysterious to us,” said Camae Ayewa and Rasheedah Phillips of Black Quantum Futurism.  “It is our honor to create work in the neighborhood we live in and share our arts practice, which has been inspired and fostered by this community for over a decade.”

Black Quantum Futurism, based in Strawberry Mansion, is an interdisciplinary creative practice between Camae Ayewa and Rasheedah Phillips that weaves quantum physics, afrofuturism, and Afrodiasporic concepts of time, ritual, text, and sound and creates counter-histories and Black quantum womanist futures that challenge exclusionary, mainstream versions of history and future.

“We are honored that Black Quantum Futurism was inspired to showcase their incredible art installation at the historic Hatfield House,” says Maura McCarthy, Ph.D., Executive Director of Fairmount Park Conservancy. “Fairmount Park has such a rich history of arts and culture, and we are excited for visitors to experience the house and the park through this new and visionary artistic lens.”


KNOW BEFORE YOU GO

Ancestors returning again / this time only to themselves

  • August 14 to September 19, 2021
  • Opening Day: Saturday, August 14, 1 – 4pm
  • Exhibition Open Hours: Wed, Sat, Sun from 1 – 5pm
  • This exhibit is free and no reservations are required; visitors will be admitted on a first-come, first-serve basis.
  • Masks are required indoors and social distancing protocols will be in place.
  • The Hatfield House is located at 33rd St. and Girard Ave. (Directions)
  • Food is not available, but guests are encouraged to bring their own food and picnic on the lawn.
  • ADA restrooms will be available on-site.

View more FAQs here.


This exhibition is organized by Past Present Projects of CultureTrust Greater Philadelphia. 

Ancestors returning again / this time only to themselves is generously funded by the Knight Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts with additional support provided by ArtPlace America.

Learn more about the Hatfield House here.