Close Up at a Distance: Mapping, Technology, and Politics (Zone Books)

The maps in this book are drawn with satellites, assembled with pixels radioed from outer space, and constructed from statistics; they record situations of intense conflict and express fundamental transformations in our ways of seeing and of experiencing space. These maps are built with Global Positioning Systems (GPS), remote sensing satellites, or Geographic Information Systems (GIS): digital spatial hardware and software designed for such military and governmental uses as reconnaissance, secrecy, monitoring, ballistics, the census, and national security. Rather than shying away from the politics and complexities of their intended uses, in Close Up at a Distance Laura Kurgan attempts to illuminate them. Poised at the intersection of art, architecture, activism, and geography, her analysis uncovers the implicit biases of the new views, the means of recording information they present, and the new spaces they have opened up. Her presentation of these maps reclaims, repurposes, and discovers new and even inadvertent uses for them, including documentary, memorial, preservation, interpretation, political, or simply aesthetic. GPS has been available to both civilians and the military since 1991; the World Wide Web democratized the distribution of data in 1992; Google Earth has captured global bird’s-eye views since 2005. Technology has brought about a revolutionary shift in our ability to navigate, inhabit, and define the spatial realm. The traces of interactions, both physical and virtual, charted by the maps in Close Up at a Distance define this shift. The past two decades have seen revolutionary shifts in our ability to navigate, inhabit, and define the spatial realm. The data flows that condition much of our lives now regularly include Global Positioning System (GPS) readings and satellite images of a quality once reserved for a few militaries and intelligence agencies, and powerful geographic information system (GIS) software is now commonplace. These new technologies have raised fundamental questions about the intersection between physical space and its representation, virtual space and its realization. In Close Up at a Distance , Laura Kurgan offers a theoretical account of these new digital technologies of location and a series of practical experiments in making maps and images with spatial data. Neither simply useful tools nor objects of wonder or anxiety, the technologies of GPS, GIS, and satellite imagery become, in this book, the subject and the medium of a critical exploration. Close Up at a Distance records situations of intense conflict and struggle, on the one hand, and fundamental transformations in our ways of seeing and of experiencing space, on the other. Kurgan maps and theorizes mass graves, incarceration patterns, disappearing forests, and currency flows in a series of cases that range from Kuwait (1991) to Kosovo (1999), New York (2001) to Indonesia (2010). Using digital spatial hardware and software designed for military and governmental use in reconnaissance, secrecy, monitoring, ballistics, the census, and national security, Kurgan engages and confronts the politics and complexities of these technologies and their uses. At the intersection of art, architecture, activism, and geography, she uncovers, in her essays and projects, the opacities inherent in the recording of information and data and reimagines the spaces they have opened up. Contents 6 Introduction 8 Mapping Considered as a Problem of Theory and Practice 10 Research conducted through practice 14 A theory machine 16 From theory to practice 17 “What is called reality is constituted in a complex of representations” 18 Representation and the Necessity of Interpretation 20 The opacity of transparency 25 Interpretation and “the view from nowhere” 31 Para-empiricism 35 Lexicon 38 From Military Surveillance to the Public Sphere 40 Global Positioning System (GPS) 40 Remote-sensing satellites 44 Geographic Information Systems (GIS) 52 Projects 56 Chapter 1. You Are Here 60 Global positioning 62 Point 63 Implied plane 70 Letters 73 Map 74 Museu 79 Fronts 81 Pixels 84 Chapter 2. Kuwait: Image Mapping 86 Kuwait: image mapping 88 Chapter 3. Cape Town, South Africa, 1968: Search or Surveillance? 98 Search or surveillance: what can we do with what we see there now? 100 Khayelitsha (before and after apartheid) 105 Chapter 4. Kosovo 1999: SPOT 083-264 114 Kosovo: SPOT 083-264, june 3 and june 6, 1999 116 A digital memorial 121 Clouded memory 125 Chapter 5. New York, September 11, 2001 130 New York, September 11, 2001, four days later 132 Chapter 6. Around Ground Zero 140 The map 142 Interview with alice twemlow 148 Chapter 7. Monochrome Landscapes 154 Monochrome Landscapes 156 Zoom 156 White 157 Blue 158 Green 159 Yellow 160 Shades of green 173 Chapter 8. Global Clock 182 Global clock 184 Chapter 9. Million-Dollar Blocks 188 What are million-dollar blocks? or, justice and the city 190 Why are so many americans in jail and prison? 191 From data to maps 193 From crime maps to admissions maps 195 Redefining the problem: mass migration and reentry 199 Money maps 202 Criminal justice as infrastructure 205 Acknowledgments 208 Exhibitions, Installations, Publications 212 Notes 218 The maps in this book are drawn with satellites, assembled with pixels radioed from outer space, and constructed from statistics; they record situations of intense conflict and express fundamental transformations in our ways of seeing and of experiencing space. These maps are built with Global Positioning Systems (GPS), remote sensing satellites, or Geographic Information Systems (GIS): digital spatial hardware and software designed for such military and governmental uses as reconnaissance, secrecy, monitoring, ballistics, the census, and national security. Rather than shying away from the politics and complexities of their intended uses, in __Close Up at a Distance__ Laura Kurgan attempts to illuminate them. Poised at the intersection of art, architecture, activism, and geography, her analysis uncovers the implicit biases of the new views, the means of recording information they present, and the new spaces they have opened up. Her presentation of these maps reclaims, repurposes, and discovers new and even inadvertent uses for them, including documentary, memorial, preservation, interpretation, political, or simply aesthetic. GPS has been available to both civilians and the military since 1991; the World Wide Web democratized the distribution of data in 1992; Google Earth has captured global bird’s-eye views since 2005. Technology has brought about a revolutionary shift in our ability to navigate, inhabit, and define the spatial realm. The traces of interactions, both physical and virtual, charted by the maps in __Close Up at a Distance__ define this shift. Content: Machine generated contents note: Mapping Considered as a Problem of Theory and Practice -- Representation and the Necessity of Interpretation -- LEXICON -- From Military Surveillance to the Public Sphere -- PROJECTS -- 1.You Are Here -- Actually to inhabit an information system -- 2.Kuwait: Image Mapping -- From within the spaces of the incriminated technologies themselves -- 3.Cape Town, South Africa, 1968: Search or Surveillance? -- The hinterlands of the Cold War-also of interest to the Corona cameras -- 4.Kosovo 1999: SPOT 083-264 -- The necessity of linking satellite images to the data that accompany their production -- 5.New York, September 11, 2001 -- In a sense, I went from one mass grave to another, but not intentionally -- 6.Around Ground Zero -- We needed not only to make a claim for a right to look, but also to help realize it -- 7.Monochrome Landscapes -- My attention was then attracted by brighter colors and by other sorts of contested territories -- 8.Global Clock -- Nothing happened -- 9.Million-Dollar Blocks -- The ''most phenomenal'' fact of all. Las dos últimas décadas han visto crecer nuestra capacidad para navegar, habitar y definir el espacio, debido a los Sistemas de Posicionamiento Global (GPS) y a las imágenes por satélite, reservadas antes a unas cuantas agencias de inteligencia o militares, y a los potentes sistemas de información geográfica (GIS), cuyo software es hoy de uso común. Las nuevas tecnologías han dado lugar a cuestiones fundamentales acerca de la intersección entre espacio físico y su representación, entre espacio virtual y su realización. Laura Kurgan expone información teórica sobre las nuevas tecnologías digitales de localización, así como una serie de experimentos prácticos de mapas e imágenes elaborados con datos espaciales, que dejan constancia de situaciones de intenso conflicto, por una parte, y de transformaciones fundamentales en nuestros modos de ver y sentir el espacio, por otra. Kurgan traza el mapa de fosas comunes, encarcelamientos o bosques desaparecidos en una serie de casos que abarcan de Kuwait (1991) a Kosovo (1999), de Nueva York (2001) a Indonesia (2010) Close Up at a Distance records situations of intense conflict and struggle, on the one hand, and fundamental transformations in our ways of seeing and of experiencing space, on the other. Kurgan maps and theorizes mass graves, incarceration patterns, disappearing forests, and currency flows in a series of cases that range from Kuwait (1991) to Kosovo (1999), New York (2001) to Indonesia (2010). Using digital spatial hardware and software designed for military and governmental use in reconnaissance, secrecy, monitoring, ballistics, the census, and national security, Kurgan engages and confronts the politics and complexities of these technologies and their uses. At the intersection of art, architecture, activism, and geography, she uncovers, in her essays and projects, the opacities inherent in the recording of information and data and reimagines the spaces they have opened up."--Pub. desc