Narrative cartography and the lure of maps
ISBN 978-85-88783-11-9
Authors
1Vaughan, L.
1RMIT Email: laurene.vaughan@rmit.edu.au
Abstract
What is it about cartography, and maps in particular, that lures artists, designers and writers? Is it the intersections between aesthetics, poetics and science? Or is it a manifestation of the desire to reveal the situated world around us, or at least be able to try? This phenomenon may be as baffling for artists and scientists alike; for it equally raises the question of what is it about the arts, that lures cartographers? Intersections between art and cartography are not new. The literature on the topic spans the fields of art, cartography, geography and design where each field makes a claim for connections and differences (Cartwright, Gartner and Lehn 2009, Harmon 2009, Abrams & Hall 2006, Cosgrove 2006, Woodward 1987). Many would say that cartography is both an art and a science, and maps are artistic representations of scientific facts. There is an ongoing discourse between maps as aesthetic interpretations, and maps as credible articulations of the geospatial nature of things. As argued by Monmonier (1996) the idea that maps are representations of truth is precarious. It could be argued that it is a loose truth, or as he argues ‘maps lie.’ Maps evolve in consort with our knowledge of the subjects of the mapping; the known world has evolved over the time of our mapping practices, and continues to do so and with that so do our mapping methods and technologies. Over the past 20 years the interdisciplinary connections in the domain of cartography have expanded to include the arts and design and new digital technologies. These inclusions have continued to transform how we know and represent the spatial world (Kitchin & Dodge 2012). In the International Cartographic Association the Art and Cartography, and the Maps and Society commissions have particularly sought to expand and engage in broader discourses of what a map is as both a social, cultural and creative artifact; what it does as a social and cultural agent; and diverse methods and contexts for map making. In 2011 the Art and Cartography commission hosted an event exploring narrative cartography at ETH Zurich (http://cartonarratives.wordpress.com). It was an ambitious event that brought together a range of practitioners from around the globe, who together explored ways we that we narrate place through cartographic means. This event, which was one in a line of experimental interventions by this community, led to the publication of two sister journals – one The Cartographic Journal, and the other an online cultural studies journal called NANO (North American Notes Online). The ambition of the editors of the two journals (William Cartwright, Sebastien Caquard, Matthew Bissen and author) was to explore the two distinct perspectives or approaches to exploring and articulating the connections between narrative and cartography. A bridging essay by Denis Wood was commissioned as a means to identify connections between the two publications, and to provide external insight into the ambitions of the project. (It features as a foreword in both publications.) As Wood notes in this essay this publishing endeavor has identified distinct approaches and interpretations of mapping and cartography and the ways that we narrate place, which can be plotted across a spectrum of the arts and science. This paper and presentation will explore through this particular set of publications some of the ways in which artists and designers are lured into the world of maps and cartography through a desire to narrate the world and their experience of it through geospatial referencing. The aim being to identify some of the ways in which their creative practices are informed by cartographic devices (linguistic and representational); and how their narrations may challenge our expectations of what is a map. It is anticipated that through this discussion some insights may be raised into the lure of the arts for cartographers.
Keywords
art; cartography; narrative