Topological Atlas produces visual counter-geographies of borders understood as topological entities through the experience of the undocumented.
Topological Atlas produces visual counter-geographies of borders understood as topological entities through the experience of the undocumented.
Our research investigates the relationship between technologies of border security, systems of documentation, border landscapes and the experience of crossing borders without papers. We approach migration as a system of circulation where deportation regimes, precarious lives and militarised borders keep people moving. We combine field research with digital methods to challenge the evidentiary urge in social research by exploring ideas around affective witnessing, incalculability and opacity.
Our research investigates the relationship between technologies of border security, systems of documentation, border landscapes and the experience of crossing borders without papers. We approach migration as a system of circulation where deportation regimes, precarious lives and militarised borders keep people moving. We combine field research with digital methods to challenge the evidentiary urge in social research by exploring ideas around affective witnessing, incalculability and opacity.
We attempt to think the atlas otherwise beyond the now well trodden ground of critiquing cartographic projections and their complicity in colonisation. Instead, we explore the relationship between neocolonial practices and cartography through considering the role of resolution in machinic vision and the deeply embedded idea of the impermeability of the earth’s surface in relation to maps. We bring the material, affective and atmospheric qualities of borders to our mapping practice in order to make room for the faint web of sedimenting relationalities that endure in place and often support the fragile movements of the undocumented.
We attempt to think the atlas otherwise beyond the now well trodden ground of critiquing cartographic projections and their complicity in colonisation. Instead, we explore the relationship between neocolonial practices and cartography through considering the role of resolution in machinic vision and the deeply embedded idea of the impermeability of the earth’s surface in relation to maps. We bring the material, affective and atmospheric qualities of borders to our mapping practice in order to make room for the faint web of sedimenting relationalities that endure in place and often support the fragile movements of the undocumented.