With the early modern age in Europe began a long-term process of intellectual development that brought with it an increasing appreciation of individual expertise as compared to the authority of traditional knowledge…
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The 19th Century in Infographics
In the 19th century there was tremendous growth in the use of information graphics, such that by the end of the century a natural proliferation of maps and diagrams can be noted across many areas of media culture…
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20th Century Infographics
From the start of the 20th century the popularization of information graphics continued just as had been observed in the century previous. New contexts and uses for info graphics included illustrated magazines, popular science books…
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Historical Infographics: Ranking Mountains
There is a very basic joy in roaming through atlases and in looking at maps. Atlases are rich collections of places, and if there is one thing they can do it is making you travel around the world, to places near and far…
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Review: The Feltron Annual Reports
Nicholas Felton‘s work has been an inspiration to many people in the field of information visualisation, not only when he helped Facebook create their timeline to “unlock people’s personal stories”, but most prominently with his series of Annual Reports which present well-chosen and beautifully designed statistics from Felton’s daily life. With these he has inspired…
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Article: “Ephemeral City” (Süddeutsche Zeitung)
Urban cartography has long been an authoritative matter: companies or authorities invested time, energy and money in researching the data and information to be published in city maps. The wide use of mobile internet is about to change this set-up dramatically. Smartphone users today collect data about how they move through the city, they comment…
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Teaching: “Diagrams, Maps, Trees” (Potsdam)
This semester, I have the great pleasure to teach again within the interface design programme of the University of Applied Sciences in Potsdam. Teaching is awesome: you get to work with talented and bright young people and you continually learn something—from having to research material for the sessions, from having to think things through in…
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Review: Map. Exploring the World
When I think about cartography, I am always fascinated by the different associations the term evokes in my brain: from map nerd to mathematical superbrain, from school atlas to interactive data visualisation, from “dusty” library map room to high end technology and design studio. It is mind-boggling to see how cartography is undergoing this major…
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Talk: “Mind the Gap” (Helsinki)
For the first time this year, the organisers behind “Visualising Knowledge” conference in Helsinki (most notably the busy and well-connected designers Juuso Koponen and Jonatan Hildén) have put together an academic symposium as a satellite event to the main conference. The panel and audience included visualisation experts and researchers from various Helsinki research institutions and…
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Talk: “Datavisualisation – age-old, brand new” (Helsinki)
As you may have figured, the history of information vis is one of my favourite research topics at the moment, and I am happy to present some of my findings whenever I can. So I gladly took the opportunity to dig deeper into the subject I had only scratched upon in my earlier talk in…
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Interview Moritz Stefaner: “The city is alive”
Moritz Stefaner came to the field of data visualisation with a background in cognitive science and interface design. His works are intriguing in their effort to create a comprehensible visual vocabulary for mapping complex data. In his latest project “Stadtbilder”, the German designer visualised geolocation data for three German cities, with the aim to show…
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The Forgotten Maps of Minard
This article is outdated. In 2018, my book on Minard’s work and legacy was published by Princeton Architectural Press. It contains lots of new insights and features — piece by piece — all statistical maps by the hand of Minard that have survived to this day. In the ever growing field of information visualisation, there…
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