Google photo maps:

Contemporary art and aerial photography visual disturbances

Abstract

Google's geographic mapping systems (Google Maps) and other service-coupled software (Google
Earth and Google Street View) use photographic registration as the primary documentation and
mapping tool for terrestrial geography. For cartographic science, aerial photography is an important
tool for the analysis and management of geographic information, and is the ideal technique for
creating a visual narrative that values likelihood, that is, for the “best” and “most faithful”
representation. possible from space. On the other hand, in this paper, I would like to discuss the
communicational meaning of the photographic records provided by Google maps from the analysis of
two photographic series created by Mishka Henner: a Belgian artist known for using photographic
archives as a research source for his works. available online. Apparently, the strategies of
appropriation, production and exhibition montage operationalized by the artist are able to multiply the
forms of communication of photographic images, and to “vary” the meaning of this set of “map
photographs” generated by the company Google.