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  1. Dartmouth Libraries
  2. Research Guides
  3. Dartmouth Libraries Guides
  4. Cartography/History of Cartography
  5. Art & cartography

Cartography/History of Cartography

This research guide will help you find books, print journals and other resources about Cartography. Cartography studies the history of maps and mapmaking and interpretation of maps.
  • Introduction
  • Understanding maps
  • Finding books
  • Finding journals & magazines
  • More cartographic resources
  • History of cartography
    • United States
    • South America
  • Projections
  • Geovisualization
  • Art & cartography
  • History through maps
  • Societies, etc.
  • Digital mapping
  • Animated maps
  • Map humor
  • Web mapping This link opens in a new window
  • Google Earth & Maps
  • Map Mashups
  • Citing cartographic information
  • Geographic Information Systems This link opens in a new window
  • Maps & Atlases This link opens in a new window
  • Scholarly communication This link opens in a new window

Introductory reading(s)

  • Cover art100 maps: the science, art and politics of cartography throughout history by John O. E. Clark, ed.
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry GA 201 .O54 2005
    ISBN: 9781402728853
    From Ptolemy's projection of the world--still the basic map after 13 centuries--to Tolkien's cartography of Middle Earth (the most printed guide to a non-existent place ever), each of these maps has its own fascinating story to tell. Escape maps, military maps, cartographic breakthroughs, and follies and forgeries: these 100 maps, organized chronologically, are the most important, dramatic, and breathtakingly beautiful ever created. They show not only the art and science of the form, but also its power. Some had devastating consequences, such the 1885 map of Africa that carved up the continent to Europeans desires. ...
  • Issue cover artArt and cartography by David Woodward, ed.
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry GA 108 .A78 1987
    ISBN: 9780226907222
    The contributors examine the historical links between art and cartography from varied perspectives.
  • Issue cover artThe cartographic journal
    • On Campus or VPN
    Call Number: Electronic journal
    ISBN: 1743-2774
    Volume 46 issue 4, November 2009 is a special issue titled Art & Cartography.
  • Cover artThe look of maps: an examination of cartographic design by Arthur H. Robinson
    • Book
    • On Campus or VPN
    Call Number: eBook
    ISBN: 9781589482623
    Based on his dissertation, this is Professor Robinson's observations that the discipline of cartography "rests at the crossroads of science and art. This book attempts to resolve the apparent disconnect by covering a range of topics related to the visual characteristics of cartographic technique, including: lettering, structure, and color. Robinson offers advice that even the modern cartographer will find relevant.
  • Cover artMap art lab: 52 exciting art explorations in mapmaking, imagination, and travel by Jill K. Berry; Linden McNeilly
    • On Campus or VPN
    • E-Book
    Call Number: eBook
    ISBN: 9781592539055
    Publication Date: 1st ed.
    Travel through the exciting world of cartography with Map Lab.

Introduction

Cartography has always had a dual nature. There those who consider cartography an art form. Others consider cartography an exact science of how one can flatten a rounded object and not distort the image.

In the Library's collection

If you do the following subject keyword search in the online catalog, "art and cartography", you will get a short, focused list. You change the index from "Any field" to "Subject." A simple keyword search using "art and cartography," will yield a longer list, but a number of the items retrieved may not be relevant to your search.

  • art AND cartography
    This is a simple keyword search. This results in a longer list but more items will be less relevant.
  • art AND cartography
    This is keyword search where you look at the subject headings for your results. This is a focused keyword search.
  • maps in art
  • cartography in art
  • artists as cartographers

Selected book title(s)

The following books look at Art within Cartography.

  • Cover artThe art of the map : an illustrated history of map elements and embellishments by Dennis Reinhartz
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry GA 108.7 .R45 2012
    ISBN: 9781402765926
    This lavishly illustrated history of the golden age of cartography, from the sixteenth through the nineteenth centuries, explores not only the embellishments on maps but also what they reveal about the world in which they were created. Here there be monsters real and imagined; ships actual and archetypical; newly discovered flora such as corn and tobacco; fauna ranging from buffalo to unicorns; godlike beings and fantasy-like depictions of native peoples. The stunningly rendered images illuminate an entire world.
  • Cover ArtCritical cartography of art and visuality in the global age by Anna Maria Guasch Ferrer; Nasheli Jimenez Del Val, eds.
    • Book
    • On Campus or VPN
    Call Number: eBook
    ISBN: 9781443860413
    Critical Cartography of Art and Visuality poses fundamental questions and pinpoints topical discussions central to the field of contemporary art studies in the global age. Resulting from a series of conversations that took place at the International Conference Critical Cartography of Art and Visuality in the Global Age (Barcelona 2013), the volume brings together current debates in cultural and identity-based art histories as a means of expanding the territory of contemporary art into the field of culture. ...
  • Die Erfindung der Landschaft : Kosmographie und Landschaftskunst im Zeitalter Bruegels by Nils Büttner
    • Book
    Call Number: Sherman N 6935 .B88 2000
  • Cover artThe image of Europe: visualizing Europe in cartography and iconography throughout the ages by Michael Wintle
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry D 907 .W56 2009
    ISBN: 9780521886345
    This book is a major study of visual representations of Europe, from the classical world to the present day, in maps, icons, the arts and graphic images of all kinds. Europe has been variously represented as the demi-goddess Europa, a bull, a horse, a son of Noah, a Magus, a queen, and the Empress of the World. This richly illustrated book charts how these visualizations of the continent have altered over time; how they interact with changing ideas of the extent and nature of Europe in relation to the other continents; and how these images have influenced and been influenced by the 'reality' of Europe. ...
  • Cover artJourneys beyond the neatline: expanding the boundaries of cartography; Expanding the boundaries of cartography : journeys beyond the neatline by Matthew J. Rangel; David L. Jones; Michael J. Coulis, curator
    • Book
    Call Number: Sherman Art Library N 8222 .M375 C68 2010
    ISBN: 9781551952581
    Published to accompany a 2010 exhibit at the University of Alberta's Cameron Library, this unique double catalogue showcases 25 pieces of cartographic artwork by Matthew Rangel and Michael Coulis.
  • Cover artMagnificent maps: power, propaganda and art by Peter Barber; Tom Harper
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry GA 190 .B368 2010
    ISBN: 9780712350921
    Maps are often as much a visual art form as they are a practical tool for navigation. Of particular visual interest are display maps--maps that often used size and beauty to convey messages of regional and social status and power. Despite their historical significance, many of these display maps have been lost and destroyed over time. Magnificent Maps brings together the best surviving examples in order to illustrate their role in early modern Europe and describe the settings in which they were displayed. ...
  • Cover artThe map as art: contemporary artists explore cartography by Katharine Harmon, ed.; Gayle Clemans
    • Book
    Call Number: Sherman Art Library N 8222 .M375 H37 2009
    ISBN: 9781568987620
    Maps can be simple tools, comfortable in their familiar form. Or they can lead to different destinations: places turned upside down or inside out, territories riddled with marks understood only by their maker, realms connected more to the interior mind than to the exterior world. These are the places of artists' maps, that happy combination of information and illusion that flourishes in basement studios and downtown galleries alike. It is little surprise that, in an era of globalized politics, culture, and ecology, contemporary artists are drawn to maps to express their visions. ...
  • Cover ArtMapping beyond measure: art, cartography, and the space of global Modernity by Simon Ferdinand
    • Book
    • On Campus or VPN
    Call Number: eBook
    ISBN: 9781496212115
    Over the last century a growing number of visual artists have been captivated by the entwinements of beauty and power, truth and artifice, and the fantasy and functionality they perceive in geographical mapmaking. This field of "map art" has moved into increasing prominence in recent years yet critical writing on the topic has been largely confined to general overviews of the field. In Mapping Beyond Measure Simon Ferdinand analyzes diverse map-based works of painting, collage, film, walking performance, and digital drawing made in Britain, Japan, the Netherlands, Ukraine, the United States, and the former Soviet Union, arguing that together they challenge the dominant modern view of the world as a measurable and malleable geometrical space. ...
  • Cover artThe marvel of maps: art, cartography and politics in Renaissance Italy by Francesca Fiorani
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry DG 445 .F56 2005
    ISBN: 9780300107272
    Among the most beautiful and compelling works of Renaissance art, painted maps adorned the halls and galleries of princely palaces. This book is the first to discuss in detail the three-dimensional display of these painted map cycles and their full meaning in Renaissance culture. Art historian Francesca Fiorani focuses on two of the most significant and marvelous surviving Italian map murals--the Guardaroba Nuova of the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence, commissioned by Duke Cosimo de’ Medici, and the Gallery of Maps in the Vatican, commissioned by Pope Gregory XIII. Both cycles were not only pioneering cartographic enterprises but also powerful political and religious images. ...
  • Orbis terrarum, ways of worldmaking by Antwerpen Open, Museum Plantin Moretus
    • Book
    Call Number: Sherman Art Library N 6488 .B4 A688 2000
    ISBN: 9789055442850
    The Orbis Terrarum, ways of worldmaking exhibition is part of the Charles V 1500-2000 project which marks the 500th anniversary of the birth of Charles V. It's being held at the Plantin-Moretus Museum in Antwerp, 22 June-24 September 2000.
  • Cover ArtRe-mapping archaeology: critical perspectives, alternative mappings by Mark Gillings; Piraye Hacigüzeller; Gary Lock, eds.
    • Book
    Call Number: Baker-Berry CC 175 .R46 2019
    ISBN: 9781138577138
    From the very beginning of archaeological practice, maps have been one of the most fundamental tools in the discipline. The number, variety and prominence of maps in archaeology have increased further since the beginning of the 1990s due to the availability of a growing range of digital technologies used to collect, visualise, query, manipulate, and analyse spatial data. However, unlike in other disciplines, the development of archaeological cartographical critique has been surprisingly slow; a missed opportunity given that archaeology can significantly contribute to the multidisciplinary field of critical mapping, thanks to its vast and multifaceted experience with space and maps. ...
  • The scholarly world of Vermeer : [Museum van het Boek, Museum Meermanno-Westreenianum, The Hague by Klaas van Berkel ... et al. ; translation by Lysbeth Croiset van Uchelen-Brouwer, Robyn de Jong-Dalziel
    • Book
    Call Number: Sherman Art Library ND 653 .V5 S36 1996
    ISBN: 9789040098253
    This book was published to accompany "The Scholarly world of Vermeer", an exhibition held in the Museum van het Boek/Museum Meermanno-Westreenianum in The Hague from 1 March to 2 June 1996.
  • Cover artWalking and mapping: artists as cartographers by Karen O'Rourke
    • Book
    Call Number: Sherman Art Library NX 175 .O76 2013
    ISBN: 9780262018500
    An exploration of walking and mapping as both form and content in art projects using old and new technologies, shoe leather and GPS. From Guy Debord in the early 1950s to Richard Long, Janet Cardiff, and Esther Polak more recently, contemporary artists have returned again and again to the walking motif. Today, the convergence of global networks, online databases, and new tools for mobile mapping coincides with a resurgence of interest in walking as an art form. In Walking and Mapping, Karen O'Rourke explores a series of walking/mapping projects by contemporary artists. ...

Keeping up with Cartography/GIS journal literature

Want an easy way to keep up with the journal literature for Cartography or GIS? And do you use a mobile device? You can install the BrowZine app and create a custom Bookshelf of your favorite journal titles. Then you will get the Table of Contents (ToCs) of your favorite journals automatically delivered to you when they become available. Once you have the ToC's, you can download and read the articles you want from the journals for which we have subscriptions.

You can get the app from the App Store or Google Play.

Don't own or use a mobile device? You can still use BrowZine! It's also available in a web version. You can get to it here. The web version works the same way as the app version. Find the journals you like, create a custom Bookshelf, get ToCs and read the articles you want.

  • << Previous: Geovisualization
  • Next: History through maps >>
  • Last Updated: May 14, 2025 12:07 PM
  • URL: https://researchguides.dartmouth.edu/cartography
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Tags: art and cartography, digital_mapping, geovisualization, map projections, map_making, mapping, Social Sciences

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