"The Artist's Artist"
Matthew Buckingham
Lize Mogel, Area of Detail (Common Room, New York)
Mogel's diverse yet precise work as an artist, curator, and editor reminds us that we never escape geography, society, and politics. In Area of Detail, Mogel examines the United Nations emblem-a map that looks "down" on Earth's Northern Hemisphere, presciently depicting the North Pole without its ice cap. As global climate change is making natural resources and shipping routes n the Arctic Circle newly accessible, the UN has become a platform for debate among arctic nations seeking to use the formerly impassable Northwest Passage. Mogel, coeditor of An Atlas of Radical Cartography, presents a new view of this familiar terrain by skillfully remapping it against the grain.
