For most of us, maps are about getting from A to B, and knowing where places are.
But one Melbourne-based Kiwi is redefining that and his maps are considered art, selling them as prints because of how unique they are.
His name is Anton Thomas, and he’s not your typical artist, he’s an artist cartographer.
He explains that “a cartographer is a map maker and I suppose all map makers are artists to some degree, but mine is particularly so because my maps are full of animals, cities and landscapes, and I really to illustrate them to bring the geography to life.”
Thomas draws all of his maps by hand.
“All by hand, colour pencils and little fine-liner pens, but pretty much completely by hand,” he said.
His love of maps and art is what led him to start with the hobby.
“Well I've always loved maps, Even when I was a kid there was a little New Zealand bird map I drew when I was about six or seven that's lying around somewhere,” he said.
Thomas lives in Melbourne now, but he’s a true Kiwi at heart.
He said his passion all started with his flatmate's old fridge.
“He (Thomas' flatmate) said, can you draw something on it, I've noticed you're good at drawing...beautify my fridge. And I spent six weeks sitting in front of this fridge just obsessively drawing this black and white pen map but it sparked something in me, I thought I feel really at home doing this work - I feel like I've found a spot that I haven't been in before, and I swore I'd follow it up,” Anton said.
So he did, with an entire continent.
“Massive map of North America - 600 city skylines and I drew that because in my early 20s I went backpacking in the US and Canada and was very inspired by the geography,” he said.
At the time Thomas still had a day job, so it took him years to complete, each carefully sketched detail proof of his passion for the planet.
“My maps - in maps in many ways - are sort of like my love letters to reality. I love the world, I love the fact we have this incredibly beautiful planet that we call home, and what I like my maps to do is display that fascination,” he said.
North America was just the beginning, soon he was drawing the whole world.
“But then with the world map - that's all the places I suppose. What inspired me there was to show a natural perspective, to remove the cities and the borders and all that stuff and actually just focus on physical geography, flora, fauna, nature around us,” he said.
So far the world has taken him two years to draw, he's aiming to be finished by early next year, and expects his painting to feature 2000 animals.
“They have to be wild, they have to be native, and they have to be extant - so not extinct. The unique, the beautiful, the endemic, and the iconic,” Thomas said.
He calls it a celebration of today’s nature.
“Sure, it's idealistic, it doesn't have any cities it doesn't have all the pollution of humanity through it but there's nothing there that isn't there.
“So, what I like to do is to bring the geography to life within the map and to make it feel a little more local, a little more familiar to humans rather than topography from a massive birds-eye-view,” he said.
As for what’s next? The world is his oyster or canvas.
SHARE ME