topherchris

ekstasis:

Fata Morgana: The World without a Map

“Unfortunately, I cannot seem to find much more information about this piece, except maybe of its name Fata Morgana [xn—slarsteinn-gbb.com]. The website features a fully functional Google Maps like view of the world, although the map is reduced to include only place names and does not feature any geographical feature…”

— information aesthetics

In the comments thread over at infosthetics, someone named Miguel found this, commented out in the source code of the site:

“Seasoned explorers, vehemently insisting on what they had seen, set down mountains and islands on their charts where there was nothing but empty sky … Expeditions sent out later to verify these new lands sometimes saw the same fata morgana, further confusing the issue. Only by prolonging their arduous journeys, thereby observing a constant recreding [sic] of the image, did they prove that the land was not there at all.”

The quote is from one Francis Spufford and you can find a bit of context for it here.

…All map, no territory.