Now Open: Mapping Alternative Ulster

For an exhibition in the Ulster Museum, I've gathered the work of about a dozen artist/cartographers, all of whom use maps to promote different ways of looking at where we live. The show is called Mapping Alternative Ulster. It has just opened and will run until June 22nd. I think a lot of this work is important, a lot of it is beautiful, a lot of it is both. A series of events runs along side the show. See: www.mappingalternativeulster.net.

The show is on in the Belfast Room, in the Ulster Museum

The first event is a workshop on 25 May, 11am. It will be run by the team behind the Belfast Sound Map, an online audio portrait of of the city. Visit the map at belfastsoundmap.org. The workshop will explore sound recording and the sonic environment of the city. Participants will be guided through a series of practical exercises (listening and technical) and then given the opportunity to make their own field-recordings to be uploaded to the map.

The workshop is open to anyone 16 or over. The workshop is free but must be booked in advance as only eight places are available. Telephone 028 90440000 (lines open Tuesday to Sunday 10am to 5pm); go to www.nmni.com; or email ulstermuseumreception@nmni.com.

Mapping Alternative Ulster, in preparation

The Belfast Room in the Ulster Museum

Every time I visit this room it is bigger than I remembered it. This is where the Mapping Alternative Ulster exhibition will be opening next month. I am curating the show for the Ulster Museum. See www.mappingalternativeulster.net for more.

Captain Cavan

Recently I made a map of Ulster by cutting out the shape of each county from a thick slab of cork. For clarity I should explain that the cork I am referring to is the stuff you plug a bottle of wine with, nothing to do with the county in Munster.

When I want to use the map the nine cork counties are arranged, jigsaw-style, on a wall.

Uncanny ...  Cavan and Captain Caveman's club.

I have found that cutting out a county’s contours is a great way of getting to know it. County Cavan is a particularly interesting shape. For me it recalls cartoons and comics. It is like the stylised form a leg of chicken takes, the ones Fred Flintstone or his buddies like to eat. But most of all Cavan is like the club wielded by Captain Caveman, the bellowing neanderthal who had his own show on television when I was a child.

Ravensdale Stones

I went tramping through the woods in Ravensdale Park lately. The park is near Jonesborough but just over the border in County Louth. I wanted to see the standing stone that was marked on my Ordnance Survey map. But what I found was a whole gang of stones, arranged in a rough circle.




You might think I'd be delighted to have found more than I had bargained for, but actually this was something rather less. A single ancient standing stone has a gravitas that these stones lacked. My main problem is that I doubt their vintage. Some of Ireland's standing stones have been in place for millennium — that is a vital part of their power. But these stones did not have that air about them. I think it was because the ring was of too small a diametre. The stones' placement lacked the scale and drama of authentic, ancient, stone rings. These have too strong a niff of the ornamental about them.

If any reader knows anything about the stone ring in Ravensdale Park then I would be very glad of the information.

Giro d'Italia

This year the annual Giro d'Italia bicycle race will open with stages in Northern Ireland. The Grande Partenza or ‘Big Start’ of the will take place over three days from 9 - 11 May 2014. It involves routes in Belfast, around the coast and, finally, a dash from Armagh to Dublin.

 

Maps of the routes have been released. The second day's is a 218km round trip; Belfast to Antrim, Ballymena, Bushmills then taking in the Causeway Coastal Route from Cushendall to Larne onto Whitehead and Carrickfergus before returning to Belfast.

An aspect of the map I like is the elevation guide. I have thrown it on its side to suit the format of this blog. You can see these maps and the others at this link.

War on Wind Farms

The writer and occasional mapmaker Denis Wood might be the one who put it best. He said; "The truth is, maps are weapons." Here's an example. The Belfast Telegraph recently used cartography to make an attack on wind power projects in Northern Ireland. This is the map they published under the heading; "Wind farms: Map reveals how they've swarmed across Northern Ireland in 13 years".



The report discusses wind power projects using the language of disease and invasion, seeking a quick emotional response from the reader; "relentless spread," "blight." It highlights one politician's shrill description of wind farms as "environmental rape." No counter augment is admitted.

The biggest impact is made by the map. Indeed, the story is built on the map. The first impression (and, sadly, the first impression is all many readers will be left with) is indeed of a swarm. There are hundreds of wind farms! There seem to be so many wind farms that at least one must be visible from anywhere. So many wind farms that you'd be able to see dozens of them from any elevated site. They seem to be more wind farms than villages and towns, more wind farms than there are hills to put them on.

 Hang on ...

Those aren't wind farms.

This map actually charts domestic wind turbines, single rotors that are bolted to people's garages or stand in their gardens. I am temped to say that the map is lying but it isn't really, but the information has been misrepresented in order to mislead. You can find the original map on the Department of Environment website. Compare the two and you can see how important contextual information has be erased on the newspaper's version. The biggest absence being the title; "Planning Applications for Single Wind Turbines, April 2002 - October 2013."

This example can be taken as a warning about the power of maps. Stop, read and think about the article and most of us could work out that we were being fooled. But, by translating its bias into a visual image this article has found a way to draw quick, unconsidered agreement. We take in the message in an instant, are disgusted with wind farms, then turn the page. A map can communicate in a powerful and immediate way that is open to abuse. It has been abused here.

Also on the Department of Environment website is the actual wind farm map. This map includes applications that were refused, withdrawn or for which a decision is still pending.



Not so much a swarm really, you could call it a sprinkle.

Mapping Alternative Ulster

Writing this blog has made me into a keen observer of mapping projects in Ulster. I seek them out whether they are produced by individual artists or groups. I am interested regardless of whatever the map's mission happens to be (a map always has a mission). There is a lot of fascinating work being done by map-makers here. Some of it is beautiful, some of it is important, some of it is both.

Exhibition website

Inside the Ulster Museum

I am please to announce that the Ulster Museum, Belfast, has entrusted me with an exhibition space for next summer. The show I am curating will be called Mapping Alternative Ulster. This show will bring together the work of geographers, mapmakers and urban planners, all of whom interpret the land in different ways. Mapping Alternative Ulster will re-think our surroundings and its representation on maps. Some of the maps going into the show have already featured in this blog, John Carson's Friend Map for example. Others have not.

Watch this space for more information has the exhibition approaches.

Right now I am seeking funding for aspects of the show. Thank you to the Arts Council of Northern Ireland who have already given me assistance.

The exhibition website is www.mappingalternativeulster.net