That is not a pipe, Mon. Magritte. But, is this not a map? Some questions about map correspondence inspired through Barbara Buttenfield

ABSTRACT

This essay considers a painting from Rene Magritte, The Treachery of Images, also known as “This is not a pipe,” the translation of the prominent statement Ceci n’est pas une pipe in the painting, which Barbara Buttenfield had prominently placed in her University of Buffalo office. It is an iconic and surrealistic twentieth century artwork (with a second version), widely copied and readily available online. Its visual juxtaposition of a textual element and detailed realist painting of a classical smoker’s pipe can quickly become more than a surrealistic play with words and images and poignantly stimulates associations and disconnections between image and object, text and object, and text and image. Viewers can also see a relevance of this painting to a number of representational issues involving images and maps. However, I want to focus in this essay on just two questions: 1) why do people affirm the connections between graphical map images and graphics in light of a fundamental disconnection between map and the represented territory or objects and 2) how do people still find sense in maps after we acknowledge the limits of any sense of correspondence between map image and experienced geography?

KEYWORDS:

• Mapping
• art
• Foucault
• representation
• correspondence

Acknowledgments

I would like to thank students and colleagues who helped develop this perspective and approach to considering artistic-related considerations in cartography. I owe a special thanks to Geoff Bowker for his comments on a very early version of this research essay. Finally, thank you to the University of Warsaw and the NAWA Chair program for their help and support of the People, Places and Events project during the preparation of this essay.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

The project is co-financed by the Polish National Agency for Academic Exchange within the NAWA Chair programme.