Collectors explore the artistic value of maps; practical, colorful guides to the world have transcended function to become a collectible art form

Art Business News, Dec, 2002 by Lisa Crawford Watson

For centuries, maps held value for their ability to help explorers chart a course through untamed lands. Maps still serve a practical function for modern-day explorers (and those just hoping to get from point A to point B). But they have also taken on a new role as a collectible art form.

In the era of Marco Polo and Columbus, the beauty of exploration lay not merely in the discovery but in the process itself and the records made of the journey. Not only were maps hand drawn, but they were crafted elaborately, with indications of routes made and imagined and illustrations of geography and landscape, flora and fauna and people and their manifestations of culture.

It is these maps, and many of those that have come hence, which, in a time when the world is considerably better known, have transcended function to reach form as their highest good. They have become art--researched, collected, reproduced and "framed" in their most meaningful and artistic sense.

The Duality of Maps

"People are drawn to maps and collect them for a couple of reasons," said Adam Gross, senior curator and editor-in-chief of Circa Publishing, a Los Angeles-based company that holds the exclusive rights for reproduction of works from The Vatican Library. "On one level, maps provide a historical and geographical sense of place through which we are able to see how things have changed over time. They illustrate what the world was like at the time the map was written, either in actuality or perception."

Gross said collectors are also drawn to the artistic elements used to create maps, particularly ancient ones. "The standard quality for most contemporary maps is offset lithography" he said. "But, 200 or more years ago, much more work and love was given to maps. They were labored upon, decorated and often hand colored. Maps that are relatively old still portray craftsmanship we rarely see anymore."

The Art of Collection

Dr. Nick Kanas, amateur astronomer and Professor of Psychiatry at University of California, San Francisco, and the Veterans Hospital in San Francisco, does not consider himself an expert in celestial cartography, but he has collected celestial maps for more than 20 years. In fact, a portion of his vast collection was included among 70 works by more than two dozen artists from the 16th century forward in "Night Skies and Imaginary Coordinates: The Artist as Navigator" which recently concluded a two-month exhibit at the Palo Alto Art Center in northern California.

"I started collecting maps over the years," said Kanas,"not only because of what they show--although how the heavens work during the year in terms of cosmology is beautiful--but because of their artistry. There are two kinds of celestial prints; those that map out the constellations and those that show the solar system."

Kanas appreciates the beauty of constellation maps in their portrayal of the figures from Greek Mythology, which tend to be aligned with the stars. Solar maps, on the other hand, such as those of the great astronomer and cartographer Ptolemy (circa 85 to 165 A.D.), appeal to the collector's sense of linear abstraction in art through the various epicycles of circles upon circles enhanced by the elaborate scrollwork framing the image.

"Not only do these maps offer a depiction of stars and coordinates for scientific value," said Kanas, "but they serve as a beautiful art form."

Maps as Art

The "age of innocence," when the world was largely uncharted and maps were vessels of discovery and vehicles for the art of hand renderings, hand coloring and gold leafing, may have died with the birth of sophisticated transport and mechanized cartography. However, only a limited or misguided assumption would conclude that contemporary maps are no longer a wellspring of art.

Of course, the debate could lead to a dissertation on the validity of lithography and digital imagery versus hand-rendered imagery as fine art. But more than that, the assumption infers a myopic view of maps merely as a form and not a source of art.

Alan James Robinson, a cartographer who calls himself the "Map Guy," has long appreciated maps as an art form through which tourists navigate or illustrate a sense of the place they have visited. He also understands the beauty of embellishment in terms of both art and information.

"A topographic map that shows the chorography, a more detailed description or analysis of a region that gives the viewer a sense of place," said Robinson. "Maps that include the mysterious mountain ranges or the face in the clouds as the wind blows also capture the intrigue of the area. They invite people to go there and try to be part of the place."

Robinson, who participated in the fly-fishing industry for 25 years and who used to teach architectural drawing, now embellishes maps with anything from the plants and animals native to the area, to the lighthouses, buildings and boats that personalize the map. A business partner with the U.S. Geological Survey and a vendor for the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA), he accesses the pristine maps of the trade, printed on 100-percent cotton rag on which to paint his lasting impressions.