New Maps, New Prints

Giclée prints are a kind of inkjet print that use fade-resistant, pigment-based archival inks. I'm using the process for the first edition of Fictional Ulster and version 3.1 of The Map of Connections. The difference is clearest in the photographs on The Map of Connections. The greens are rich and deep.

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The Map of Connections is 60 x 85 cm. Fictional Ulster is 50 x 70 cm. They are both editions of fifty.

Charting the Border on the Radio

My BBC Radio 4 documentary is still available to listen to online. It is about Ireland's border and The Map of Connections.

The progamme was originally broadcast at the end of June

Thank you to the producer, Rachel Hooper, and to Paddy Bloomer who canoed part of the Erne system with me for the recording. Thanks also to all the border citizens we meet along the way.

These photos illustrate parts of the show.

Armagh

On the Erne with Paddy Bloomer

Erne system connection

At the show's last connection, Londonderry/Donegal.

Mapping Alternative Ulster: Guided Tour

Thank you to everyone who came along on May 31st. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. Reading the comments cards that people filled in and gave me after the tour I discovered that one of our number was a tourist who was only spending a couple of days in Northern Ireland. I like to think that he spent his time well. This show is Ulster in a room.

Thank you to Alan Meban for the photos

The exhibition is running until June 22nd. There are a few more events upcoming. See mappingalternativeulster.net for details.

The Map of Connections 3.1

I've put the latest version of The Map of Connections in the Mapping Alternative Ulster show. It is one of my maps of Ireland's border. I have charted on it unofficial border crossings, paths, stiles, gates, footbridges, anything not found on other maps. Most are humble things in themselves but, all together, they seemed to add up to some kind of statement about human irrepressibility. There are 77 connections charted in this version.

It is 60 by 85 centimetres.

The show runs until June 22nd.

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.