The Map Room

Imaginary Coordinates, a controversial exhibition that juxtaposed contemporary Israeli and Palestinian art with antique maps of the region, has been closed prematurely by the Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies, which had been putting on the show as part of Chicago’s Festival of Maps. It had originally been scheduled through September, and has already been closed and reopened to change the lighting and the language of some labels. Critics charged that parts of the show were anti-Israel, which put the Jewish museum in an uncomfortable spot.

Hugh Yeman writes, “I recently caught the cartography bug, and I’ve spent the last several weeks writing almost exclusively about two visits to the Chicago Festival of Maps. As I’ve researched the exhibit items I’ve been quite surprised to find no other in-depth articles about the festival. Since the ‘Maps: Finding Our Place in the World’ exhibit is coming to Baltimore next month, I’m hopeful that my blog will generate interest in that event.” Hugh’s entries aren’t tagged or categorized, but you’ll find the entries in question in his January and February monthly archives.

The Festival of Maps continues to ripple through the media: yesterday’s New York Times carried a review of the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, focusing on the remarkable Atwood sphere, which predated more modern planetarium projectors, and the Mapping the Universe exhibition, which showcases the Adler’s collection of antique star charts. The exhibition ends March 2. Via MapHist.

The Wall Street Journal reviews two exhibits from Chicago’s Festival of Maps: the flagship Field Museum exhibit (of course), along with one of two exhibits at the Newberry Library, Ptolemy’s Geography and Renaissance Mapmakers. (Actually, the Newberry claims three exhibits, since Newberry historians curated the Field Museum exhibit.) The remaining Newberry exhibit is Mapping Manifest Destiny: Chicago and the American West; Doug Knox writes to report that a full-colour catalogue of the exhibit is available from the library’s bookstore.

Today’s edition of the Washington Post reviews the Festival of Maps in Chicago, and in the process mentions that the vaunted Field Museum exhibit will be on display in a Baltimore museum come March. Hold the phone: this sucker’s going on tour?

Previous entries about the Festival of Maps: CSM on the Festival of Maps, Map Art and Books; Festival of Maps Reviews; Festival of Maps: Field Museum Roundup; Festival of Maps: Field Museum Exhibit Virtual Gallery; Festival of Maps Update: Book, KML; Festival of Maps Now Open; Major Field Museum Exhibit Announced (Again); Chicago’s Festival of Maps.

• Buy Maps: Finding Our Place in the World at Amazon.com

A piece in last Friday’s Christian Science Monitor looks at the Festival of Maps through the lens of map art, referencing our friend Nikolas Schiller, the special map art issue of Cartographic Perspectives, the book accompanying the Field Museum exhibition,…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Brendan Crain writes, “I have seen a few posts on The Map Room about the Festival of Maps here in Chicago. I just wanted to let you know that I’ve been attending and reviewing the shows around town. Here’s a…  •  Continue reading this entry.

More about the Field Museum’s exhibit, Maps: Finding Our Place in the World: Antiques and the Arts Online has a rundown (via Map the Universe); Chicago Public Radio has audio from the first of a series of lectures taking place…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Can’t get to Chicago for the Festival of Maps? (No. Dammit.) Fortunately, says Navteq’s Kevin Lenane, there’s an online version of the vaunted Field Museum exhibit. “This is the virtual gallery we did for the Field Museum Maps Exhibit,”…  •  Continue reading this entry.

“The University of Chicago Press has a special web feature to celebrate the publication of Maps: Finding Our Place in the World, the book that accompanies the exhibit currently at the Field Museum in Chicago,” writes Dean Blobaum. “The…  •  Continue reading this entry.

Chicago’s Festival of Maps officially opened on Friday; in addition to its new website, which went live in September, there is also a Festival of Maps blog to help us keep track of the proceedings. And there’s a lot to…  •  Continue reading this entry.

For a map exhibition that doesn’t even open until November, the Field Museum’s Maps: Finding Our Place in the World is sure getting a lot of advance publicity — I first reported on it last September. But organizers believe the…  •  Continue reading this entry.

I must find a way to get to Chicago this November; the Festival of Maps sounds huge: Opening November 2, 2007 and continuing into 2008, the Festival of Maps Chicago is a citywide celebration of humanity’s greatest discoveries and the…  •  Continue reading this entry.