Help me populate some empty countries. Ahem.

[devi]

All this year I've been dreaming of maps, so I thought I'd try to paint some. I started with no plan in mind and a random wiggly line for the coast and built the contours up from there. Of course, they're not remotely as cool as the ones in my dreams, which are part map, part blueprint, part weird schematic diagram. I don't even think they're that interesting as paintings, standing alone. But I have a plan for them, as part of my exhibition at the Magic Café in January, and I'm going to need your help.

There are no people on these maps. No towns, no roads, no names on anything. They're empty landscapes. I was going to see what they suggested to me and draw cities and roads and stuff on with a marker, but then I had a more interesting idea. I want you to populate them for me.

All contributions will be welcome. No matter how small. No matter how mundane or fanciful or frivolous. Anything from a one-line comment saying "I think there'd be a bridge there" right up to an extensive treatise on the history, culture and economy of the land. What I'd be especially happy for you to do is to download one of the large images behind the thumbnails, draw features on it and mail it back to the address in my userinfo. Or just comment on this post – comments with ideas in will be left screened because I don't want people's ideas to influence each other. What I hope will be really interesting about this is what different people will see in the same image.

For the exhibition, I'll compile everyone's contributions and map images into a book which will be displayed alongside the paintings. (Let me know if you want to be credited by username or otherwise.) There'll also be images of the blank map available there, so people at the café can add their own ideas. It might be part of my website eventually. I'll be doing my own version, possibly versions, but my contribution is no more important than yours.


Where are the cities/towns/villages, if any?
What are the names of the landscape features?
How do people travel around?
What sort of culture(s) live there?
Are they high-tech or low-tech?
How do they make their living?
What do they do and where do they go for fun?
Are they indigenous people or recent settlers or a mixture of both?
What's the history of the area? How about the politics?
Are there ruins of past civilisations? Sites of past battles? If so, why were the battles fought?
Do they all get along or are there tensions between different areas?
Are there legends or old stories related to the landscape?


…basically, anything whatsoever that occurs to you about what might go on in these landscapes. There are no rules or constraints. The colours are only supposed to indicate contours, not necessarily climate. The two maps may or may not be part of the same world. You tell me.

If you like this, please spread the word – I want to get as many contributions as I can. Please get it in by 20th December, to give me a chance to compile it all into a folder, though if you send me stuff before that I'll appreciate it. I'll unscreen comments when it's all over. The exhibition will be running from the 4th to the 31st of January at the Magic Café, Magdalen Road, Oxford.

Thank you!

(Oh, and check out strangemaps, as recommended by tamaranth, for possible inspiration, weirdness and general map-geek joy.)

Comments

[juliet]

Archipelago:

Travelling primarily via boat - small boats, that hug the coast rather than venturing out across the deeper water in the centre of the ring of islands. The inhabitants mostly live around the edge of the water, but do travel into the forested areas for food. The main town and local seat of government is currently at the mouth of the river on the south-west, but historically there was a second centre of political power at the monastery on the island just to the north of that. That island still has the second largest population, but the old city at the river mouth, that served the monks, is falling into ruins and people are spreading out along the coast instead. There are only a handful of elderly monks left on the monastery at the top of the mountain, by the river source - whether the decline of the monastery is a result of, or the cause of, its loss of power isn't entirely clear.

Fjords:

A small, fairly isolated fishing and farming settlement by the lake at the top - subsistence mountain farming, goat-based. The fish (salmon) are plentiful, though. It's possible for them to get over the mountain to the villages nearer the other river, but only outside of the winter months.