|
Bill Rankin is a historian and cartographer. His mapping activity is focused on reimagining everyday urban and territorial geographies by pushing techniques of statistical information design and rethinking everyday cartographic conventions. His maps have appeared in several publications and exhibitions, including articles in Perspecta, Harvard Design Magazine, and National Geographic and shows at Harvard University, Pratt Institute, the Cartographic Bienalle in Lausanne, Switzerland, and the Toronto Images Festival; several of his maps are also traveling with ICI’s “Experimental Geographies” show through 2011. Most of his cartography can be seen on his website, www.radicalcartography.net. His historical research is about the changing technologies of cartography and navigation in the twentieth century. He is currently writing a book on this subject and teaching as an assistant professor in the history of science program at Yale.
Radicalcartography.net has been featured on a number of websites and newsblogs, including the Washington Post, Le Monde, the New York Times, ARTnews, Fast Company (twice), Metafilter (twice), BoingBoing (twice), the Very Short List, Flowing Data, Visual Complexity, Apartment Therapy, Gawker, Gothamist, and many others. My academic home page is here. My Wikipedia alter-ego is here. SELECTED WORK IN CARTOGRAPHY ESSAYS AND PUBLISHED MAPS
“Urban Legends,” Boston Review (Nov–Dec 2010). Essay and maps about race, class, and the
idea of the “inner city” in the Unitd States.
“Cartography and the Reality of Boundaries,” Perspecta [Journal of the Yale School of
Architecture] 42 (Spring 2010). Essay and maps about neighborhood demography,
“community areas,” and the Chicago School of Urban Sociology.
Maps of U.S. agriculture, demographics, suicide, and subways. In Mapping America: Exploring
the Continent, edited by Fritz Kessler and Frank Jacobs. London: Black Dog, 2010.
“Landscapes of Specialization.” In Ecological Urbanism, edited by Mohsen Mostafavi
and Gareth Doherty. Baden: Lars Müller, 2010
“Local Food is Not Always the Most Sustainable Food,” Harvard Design Magazine 31
(Autumn/Winter 2009–2010). Essay and maps about the geography of
agriculture in the United States.
“Arctic Land Grab,” National Geographic Vol. 215, No. 5 (May, 2009): 108–124. Maps about
seafloor mapping missions, oil exploration, territorial claims, and the politics of the UN Law
of the Sea in the Arctic Ocean.
“Urban Mass Transit Systems of North America.” ArchitectureBoston (Winter 2009).
Comparative analysis of subway-network topologies. (Collaboration with Jeanne Haffner.)
The Cargo Chain, a pamphlet and wall map about intermodal transport, published by the Center
for Urban Pedagogy, Brooklyn, 2008. Maps of global and North-American intermodal flows
and infrastructure. (Collaboration with Labor Notes, the Longshore Workers’ Coalition, and
Thumb Design.)
EXHIBITIONS
“Tabula Repleta.” Maps of land management and population in central Arizona. Included
in “The 43 Uses of Drawing,” an exhibt at the Rugby Art Gallery & Museum curated by Craig Staff
and Paul Cureton, September–October 2011.
“A Taxonomy of Transitions.” Map and video about racial/ethnic segregation in Chicago. Winner
of the MiniMax mapping contest at the “Moving Maps” cartographic biennale in Lausanne, Switzerland.
Organized by the Eidolon research network (École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Laval
University, and the University of Bergamo), April 2011.
“NIMBY vs. WIMBY.” Maps of racial segregation in New York City. Included in “You Are Here:
Mapping the Psychogeography of New York City,“ an exhibit at the Pratt Manhattan Gallery curated
by Katherine Harmon, September–November 2010.
Selection of digital posters included in “Medium Resistance” exhibition curated by
Nicholas Kripal, Richard Hricko, and Philip Glahn of Crane Arts and the Tyler School of
Art, in conjunction with “Philagrafika 2010: The Graphic Unconscious,” Philadelphia,
March–April 2010.
“A Landscape of Specialization” and “The Density of Food.” Maps and animations about
American and global agriculture. Included in “Ecological Urbanism,” an exhibit at the
Harvard Graduate School of Design curated by Gareth Doherty, March–May 2009.
“We The People?” and “My Cities.” Maps about American Indian sovereignty and personal
urban geographies. Included in “Experimental Geography,” an Independent Curators
International exhibition curated by Nato Thompson and Daniel Tucker, traveling 2008–
2010. Published in Experimental Geography: Radical Approaches to Landscape, Cartography, and
Urbanism, Nato Thompson, ed. (Brooklyn: Melville House, 2008).
“Exploring Nice, Mapping Nice.” An interactive project on tourism in Nice, France. Included
in Toronto Images Festival “Transposing Geographies” exhibit curated by Christina Battle
and Sara MacLean, 2006. (Collaboration with Kayte Young.)
“Radical Cartography” solo exhibition at Adams House Art Space, Harvard University, 2003.
Featured in the Harvard Crimson, November 14, 2003.
LECTURES, TELEVISION, AND RADIO
Maps of U.S. federal land used in “How the States Got Their Shapes,” History Channel, 2011.
Invited artist and lecturer for “Remapping the Desert: Phoenix,” a multiyear artist research
project sponsored by the Future Arts Research program at Arizona State University. October 2009.
“Cartography and Urban Analysis,” lecture to the Harvard Graduate School of Design summer
program, July 2009.
Guest on BBC 4 radio program, “Shifting Meridians,” discussing the history and politics of
time-zone maps. Aired May 21, 2006.
|