The Art of Mapping

This St Andrew’s Day, the James Hutton Institute will join forces with author and map artist, Andrew Redmond Barr; to explore the historical, cultural, societal and scientific impact of maps.

Author of the Atlas of Scotland: A Vision of a Nation; Andrew hand-draws maps to illustrate Scotland’s history as an ancient kingdom of Europe and show how Scotland’s topography has shaped where people live and how this has influenced their artistic response to their environment.

Senior scientist Dr Mike Rivington from the Institute will contribute his expertise in maps from the perspective of climate change projections. His maps provide insight into the future on how we can use the land and what we can grow; all of which will have a huge impact on how we live as a society.

Dr Annabel Pinker, also from the Institute, will give a different perspective on mapping –looking at how we can make maps of place (as bodily, sensory, and feeling experiences) rather than simply territory. She will compare the way that maps, used in development processes, tend to depict land as an abstraction, through which place and local meanings, are erased in favour of speculative infrastructural futures. She will use local examples to point to the ways that such creative forms of local mapping can make visible what planning maps often mask.

Haggis will be served at this event, along with potatoes grown at the James Hutton Institute (5kg sacks will be available to purchase at the event).