Tag: Rumsey

An Exhibition on Transit Maps and Identity

Published on by Jonathan Crowe
A map of bus lines in Paris in 1879.
Recettes des Lignes d’Omnibus de Paris en 1879, Ministère des Travaux Publics (1881). David Rumsey Map Collection.

An exhibition at the David Rumsey Map Center at Stanford University, You Are Here: Transit Cartography and Spatial Identity, explores the evolving design language of transit maps and the relationship of that design language with the identity of the place being mapped.

You Are Here, title illustration

You Are Here explores the unique relationship between regional and global transit maps and the socio-cultural identity of their subjects. Transit maps can be utilitarian, functioning as navigational tools, but they can also be aspirational, signs of cities and nations attempting to shift perceptions of their identity. The individual maps in this exhibition serve as a window into the histories of the places they represent as well as the history of transit cartography as a whole. With a wider view, the evolution of transit maps demonstrates how a transportation system can become synonymous with a city or nation’s identity, reflecting its change over time, spearheading cartographic innovations, or reifying an entirely new vision for space and place.

More at Stanford Report. The usual suspects (Beck, Vignelli) make appearances, but there are some interesting Chinese, Russian and colonial examples here as well. You Are Here was curated by Jayne Killander, the winner of a California Map Society student curation competition. The exhibition is both in-person and online; it opened March 25 and runs until August 21, so if you’re in the area, hurry up; I imagine the online version will stay up, at least for a bit. [Cartonaut]

Above & Below: Cartography Beyond Terrain

Published on by Jonathan Crowe
Poster from the Above & Below exhibition at Stanford’s David Rumsey Map Center.

Above & Below: Cartography Beyond Terrain, an exhibition at Stanford Library’s David Rumsey Map Center that launched in conjunction with this year’s Ruderman Conference, “explores how cartography depicts the depths of the Earth, the ocean floor, weather systems, the solar system, and even the seemingly intangible internet—anything but the thin boundary that divides land and sky that we tend to associate with maps.” Free admission, on display through 27 February 2026.

A Stranger Quest Now Available Online

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

A Stranger Quest, the documentary about David Rumsey by Andrea Gatopolous, is now available to the public online, having made its debut last year at the Torino Film Festival (previously) and made the rounds of the film festival circuit. In it, Rumsey, who turned 80 this year, ruminates about loss and mortality, filtered through various lenses: the loss of a friend, the legacy created by a lifetime of map collecting. And let me tell you, it’s a trip. It’s not so much about maps (though the Urbano Monte reconstruction makes several appearances), or map collecting, as it is about a particular map collector; and it approaches its subject edgewise. With long silences, and long scenes shot from enough distance that they make the viewer feel like they’re eavesdropping on private conversations rather than watching a documentary, to say nothing of extended sojourns in Second Life, it’s far from what I would have expected, but I cannot deny the overwhelming art of it.

A Stranger Quest: A Documentary About David Rumsey

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Map collector David Rumsey—he of the eponymous website and Stanford map center—is the subject of a new documentary directed by Italian filmmaker Andrea Gatopolous. A Stranger Quest premieres at the Torino Film Festival later this month and is scheduled for a 2024 release. The trailer, above, doesn’t reveal much. [Kottke]

David Rumsey Map Collection: More Than Just Digitization

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Urbano Monte 1587 World Map, digitally assembled (David Rumsey Map Collection)
David Rumsey Map Collection

The David Rumsey Map Collection has a blog post that explains that they do more than just scan old maps.

When we digitize historical maps we create copies that can be shared and used by all. But we also create the potential to repurpose these copies to advance understanding of the original maps. To do this, we create composite maps, georeferenced maps, composite views, interactive globes, composite texts and other types of digital versions that expand map interpretation and enhance use. Below are some examples of these interpretive maps that we have created over the past 20 years. To date we have created 1,674 interpretive composite maps, views, and texts as well as over 56,000 georeferenced maps.

Examples at the blog post—some of which we’ve already seen, including the digital assembly of Urbano Monte’s 1587 world map (above).

‘Map Heaven’

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

“I call this ‘map heaven,’” said G. Salim Mohammed, the center’s head and curator. “This is a place where maps come alive.”

The San Francisco Chronicle’s piece on the David Rumsey Map Center (paywalled; alternative Apple News+ link) focuses on the digital experiments undertaken by the center to make maps more accessible. (Examples we’ve covered here previously include digitally assembled versions of the Urbano Monte Map and a 1940 model of San Francisco, and also an AR globe app.) [David Rumsey Map Collection]

2021 Ruderman Conference Announced

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Registration is now open for the third biennial Barry Lawrence Ruderman Conference on Cartography. As in previous years, the conference will be hosted by Stanford’s Rumsey Map Center but this time it will take place online, and run from October 20 to 22, 2021. The theme this time around is Indigenous mapping.

This theme is of paramount importance, especially as Indigenous peoples around the world continue to fight for their recognition and rights to land and resources. Simultaneously, institutions are increasingly examining their roles in exploitative imperial expansion and settler colonialism. The history of colonial encounter and of indigenous agency can both be glimpsed in historical maps, many of which were made by Indigenous peoples or thanks to crucial, and often unacknowledged, Indigenous contributions. More recently, mapping technologies are helping Indigenous groups to monitor resources, protect language, survey territory, govern, and provide evidence for reclamation and recognition procedures. Scholars, many of them Indigenous, are voicing their critiques and interventions using geographic and cartographic frameworks.

Alex Hidalgo, Mishuana Goeman, and Eric Anderson and Carrie Cornelius will provide keynotes. The conference will run from October 2o to 22, 2021 and is free to attend (virtually). More information; registration form.

New Exhibition: Mapping the Islamic World

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Map from Kâtip Çelebi’s Cihannüma, 1732. Barry Ruderman Map Collection. Creative Commons licence.

A new online exhibition at Stanford Libraries’ Rumsey Map Center: Mapping the Islamic World: The Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal Empires. Curated by guest curator Alexandria Brown-Hejazi, the exhibition, which opened last week, “explores maps of the Islamic World, focusing on the ‘Gunpowder Empires’ of Ottoman Turkey, Safavid Persia, and Mughal India. […] A rich cartographic exchange took place between these three empires and European powers, as maps were used to chart their expansive territories, military campaigns, and trade routes.”

Mapping the Global Imaginary

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

In February 2019 a conference on the blurred line between factual and fictitious mapping in history, Mapping the Global Imaginary, 1500-1900, took place at Stanford University’s David Rumsey Map Center. Which I somehow missed. But no worries: videos of the conference panels are available online (see above for the first one), as is the talk by the keynote speaker, Sumathi Ramaswamy.

2019 Ruderman Conference Announced

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

The 2019 edition of the biennial Barry Lawrence Ruderman Conference on Cartography has been announced. Like the inaugural conference in 2017, it will take place at the David Rumsey Map Center at Stanford University, this time from October 10 to 12. Gender is the theme of this year’s conference.

For this year’s meeting, all the papers will focus on the relationship between gender, sexuality, and cartography. While some scholars have examined the interplay of gender identities and mapping, particularly with regard to the role of women as buyers and sellers in the historical map market, this work remains isolated and has yet to make a significant impact on the wider field. This conference hopes to offer a counterpoint to this trend by bringing together diverse approaches and hosting interdisciplinary discussions.

The keynote speaker is Susan Schulten. Registration costs $100, or $25 if you’re a student.

Giant 1940 Model of San Francisco Digitally Assembled

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

WPA model of San Francisco (David Rumsey Map Collection)

A massive wooden model of the city of San Francisco that has not been on display, at least in one piece, since 1942 has been re-assembled as a virtual model by the David Rumsey Map Collection. Built by the WPA, the model was assembled from 158 individual pieces to form a massive, 42×38-foot (12.8×11.6m) model at a scale of 1:1,200, and represented a snapshot of the city as it was in 1940. It’s available as a single composite image, as well as images of individual pieces; a Google Earth layer enables the model to be viewed at an oblique angle and superimposed on modern satellite imagery. Sections of the model itself will be on display at various branches of the San Francisco Public Library as part of Bik Van der Pol’s Take Part project; the exhibits will take place between 25 January and 25 March 2019. [Boing Boing]

Previously: Urbano Monte’s 1587 World Map, Digitally Assembled.

The Urbano Monte Map in 20 Different Projections

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

Orthographic
Orthographic
Goode Homolosine
Goode Homolosine
Hammer
Hammer
Dymaxion
Dymaxion

More on Urbano Monte’s 1587 world map, which, you may remember, the Rumsey Collection digitally assembled into a single map from 60 manuscript pages. Now Visionscarto has taken it a step further, with a web tool that reprojects a map into other projections, taking the map’s original polar azimuthal equidistant projection and transmogrifying it into 20 other projections. Yes, sure, the Mercator is one of them, but so are the Goode Homolosine, the Hammer—even the Dymaxion. The tool is available on both the Visioncarto and Rumsey Collection websites. [David Rumsey]

Previously: Urbano Monte’s 1587 World Map, Digitally Assembled; Van Duzer Assesses Urbano Monte’s Work.

The Rumsey Collection’s Augmented Reality Globe App

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

The David Rumsey Map Collection has a number of virtual globes, but its AR Globe app may be the most unusual way to view them. Released last December for the iPhone and iPad, it uses augmented reality to superimpose one of seven celestial or terrestrial globes from the 15th through 19th centuries. The globes can be manipulated—spun, zoomed in and out—or observed from the inside (which is a good thing with celestial globes).

To be honest I’m not sold on using augmented reality to view virtual globes. It’s one thing to use AR to superimpose IKEA furniture in your living room: that makes sense, because it helps you visualize where the furniture would go and what it would look like. But it’s hard to see the utility of plunking a virtual globe in your living room: what’s the point of adding your surroundings as a backdrop? Case in point:

It’s neat but not particularly useful, is what I’m saying.

Van Duzer Assesses Urbano Monte’s Work

Published on by Jonathan Crowe

David Rumsey Map Collection

More on Urbano Monte’s 1587 world map, a copy of which the Rumsey Collection acquired last year (see previous entry). Chet Van Duzer presented his findings on the map and the mapmaker at Stanford last month, LiveScience reports. His conclusion? Monte was “both a mastermind and a copycat”—and not a very good artist, either. But the map is still very interesting. [WMS]