PERSONAL TERRITORIES
‘..the map of the world is not a mathematical system but the constantly varying, evolving result of human relations.’
from ‘Mappa’ by Luca Cerizza writing on Alighiero e Boetti, Afterall Books 2008
In 2012, I began inviting individuals to gift me a map of some personal significance, with the idea of making a collection of maps characterised by personal references to them and now, also to me.
The element that unites maps throughout history is a desire for understanding location: the need to know where we are in the world.
I like to imagine Fra Mauro, a monk who lived on the island of Murano in the Venetian lagoon in the 1450’s, making Mappa Mundi using information sent to him and collected from travellers passing through Venice. His map in the Correr Museum in Venice has some 3000 different pieces of information; often updated & collaged on.
Each of us ‘floats’ over our individual territory, which from time to time we choose to map; for there is still necessary reference to the physical map, in spite of the proliferation of data and new interaction technologies which make maps all the richer, dynamic and immersive.
Personal Territories is very simply my way of mapping the world with the collaboration of people that I know.
There is a diary of contributions that serves as a record of dates and correspondence; a digital map acts as a key to list of participants.
In the tradition of all great map collections, the documents have been collated and catalogued, held responsibly in perpetuity, to be displayed publicly and privately from time to time.
Each name represents a map, each map represents a world.
Thank You to all who have contributed to ‘Personal Territories’.
