2022
The Mercator Atlases, Bordeaux
integral designers created the exhibition design and graphics for “Mercator’s Atlases: The World as a Mirror,” on display at the Bordeaux Library from November 7, 2022, to January 22, 2023.
The exhibition, dedicated to the founder of modern cartography, is organized into three themes: the restoration of the atlases, the revolution in cartography, and Gérard Mercator today.
The geographer was the first to use a compass rose on a printed globe. On the exhibition walls, a large hand-painted mural features this motif at its center, serving as a tribute to Mercator and a structural element of the exhibition design. Directional lines radiate from each cardinal point of this figure, serving as reference points for the displayed textual and iconographic materials.
The graphic and symbolic richness inherent in the geographer’s representations—and thereby their relevance—led us to design a visual language for the exhibition built from elements of Mercator’s maps: the use of color, line systems, typographic work referencing the humanist movement, and the choice of manual interventions. This entire process of reappropriation highlights the contemporary nature of the figure and his work.
Design team — Benjamin Ribeau, Maren Hollmann Mural
execution — Juliette Rey