CyberAtlas

The maps featured in CyberAtlas can only be viewed with a browser set to load images.

G U G G E N H E I M M U S E U M

The Project The Maps

What is a frontier, if not a territory for which the definitive map has not yet been drawn? At the turn of the millennium, this description still applies readily to cyberspace, which despite its etymological origin--the Greek word kyberos, meaning "helmsman"--still leaves many visitors feeling adrift without landmarks to steer by. Even people who find it easy to navigate physical spaces often have difficulty visualizing an electronic one.

CyberAtlas, a project of the Guggenheim Web site and Guggenheim magazine, is a concerted effort to chart this terra incognita. The aim of CyberAtlas is to commission and collect a series of maps of cyberspace, with a particular focus on sites related to visual art and culture. Unlike the typical navigational chart, the maps in CyberAtlas can take you where you want to go as well as tell you how to get there: clicking on a Web site in any of the maps will transport you immediately to the corresponding page on the Internet.

Would-be charters of cyberspace face some challenges similar to those encountered by early cartographers of the New World. Proportions are difficult to gauge in a territory as vast as the World Wide Web; hence the maps in CyberAtlas will necessarily vary in perspective and emphasis, just as the Massachusetts coastline loomed large in 16th-century English maps while the Florida coast loomed large in Spanish ones. Unlike their 16th-century predecessors, cybercartographers may find time a more daunting challenge than space. While John Cabot and Juan Ponce de Leon could assume for all practical purposes that continents stayed put once they were charted, the frenetic pace of Web site proliferation and domain name registration means that entire new cybercontinents surface while others sink on a monthly basis.
One result of this accelerated continental drift is that some of the addresses and links in older maps will go out of date with the passage of time. They are preserved in this CyberAtlas as historical records of the very recent past: snapshots from a perspective, and of a cyberspace, that may no longer exist.

The Electric Sky
introduction

Bright stars in the firmament of online art and the networks that support them. Charted by Jon Ippolito, Spring 1996.

Intelligent Life
introduction

A thematic map that traces connections between recent scientific developments and art, theory, and popular culture. Charted by Laura Trippi, Spring 1997.

get some
help return to the
guggenheim home page meet the
contributors

G U G G E N H E I M M U S E U M
The Project		The Maps
What is a frontier, if not a territory for which the definitive map has not yet been drawn? At the turn of the millennium, this description still applies readily to cyberspace, which despite its etymological origin--the Greek word kyberos, meaning "helmsman"--still leaves many visitors feeling adrift without landmarks to steer by. Even people who find it easy to navigate physical spaces often have difficulty visualizing an electronic one. CyberAtlas, a project of the Guggenheim Web site and Guggenheim magazine, is a concerted effort to chart this terra incognita. The aim of CyberAtlas is to commission and collect a series of maps of cyberspace, with a particular focus on sites related to visual art and culture. Unlike the typical navigational chart, the maps in CyberAtlas can take you where you want to go as well as tell you how to get there: clicking on a Web site in any of the maps will transport you immediately to the corresponding page on the Internet. Would-be charters of cyberspace face some challenges similar to those encountered by early cartographers of the New World. Proportions are difficult to gauge in a territory as vast as the World Wide Web; hence the maps in CyberAtlas will necessarily vary in perspective and emphasis, just as the Massachusetts coastline loomed large in 16th-century English maps while the Florida coast loomed large in Spanish ones. Unlike their 16th-century predecessors, cybercartographers may find time a more daunting challenge than space. While John Cabot and Juan Ponce de Leon could assume for all practical purposes that continents stayed put once they were charted, the frenetic pace of Web site proliferation and domain name registration means that entire new cybercontinents surface while others sink on a monthly basis. One result of this accelerated continental drift is that some of the addresses and links in older maps will go out of date with the passage of time. They are preserved in this CyberAtlas as historical records of the very recent past: snapshots from a perspective, and of a cyberspace, that may no longer exist.		The Electric Sky introduction Bright stars in the firmament of online art and the networks that support them. Charted by Jon Ippolito, Spring 1996. Intelligent Life introduction A thematic map that traces connections between recent scientific developments and art, theory, and popular culture. Charted by Laura Trippi, Spring 1997.