Abstract Layers of Territory: Maps by David Lemm

David Lemm is a visual artist and designer based in Edinburgh, Scotland. His production ranges widely from illustrations to collages, multi-media projects, prints, and installations, but all of his works share a consistent interest for synthesis and abstraction. A recurring theme in Lemm’s research is the translation of elements of the landscape, natural or urban, in the form of symbols and shapes recreating a visual narrative. This approach leads his personal take on the subject of cartography, in which the construction of maps becomes a way to talk about memory, physical and mental structures, and imagination.

Mapping Eigg is a project which resulted from a residency at Sweeney’s Bothy on the Isle of Eigg as part of the Life Off the Grid project with Edinburgh University and The Bothy Project. David Lemm took his inspiration from the story of an infamous map lost on the island, to develop a series of experimental maps which translate spatial and human relationships on the site emerged through conversations with residents, journeys, reflections.

Lemm subsequently developed this method through workshops with school groups at various locations.

Another example of Lemm’s approach is the work Landshapes, in which a series of prints maps the journey up the Sgurr Alasdair, the highest peak on Skye. This time, the design describes the views encountered by the artist and translates them in shapes which move between the figurative and the abstract. The work was commission by ATLAS Arts to create a limited edition artwork in the form of postcards.

All images © David Lemm