Global Ghost Map

This essay reflects on how drawing might engage us in a subjective connection to elsewhere. John Snow's use of mapping to evidence cholera as a water-borne disease, current digital representations of place and the politics of contemporary disease outbreaks are considered. The artist goes looking for something while sitting still in place – seeking geographical indicators of human activity on the screen and translating these images through a process of mark making. Different registers of value are indicated by the sharp or poor image, and patterns and traces of movement are deliberated as a process of unintentional drawing on the planet's surface. Empathetic connection to the other, openness to visualising the patterns unfolding during times of pandemic and ecological crises are proposed as means of moving towards a different understanding of Planetary Health – that all life, both local and distant, matters.

Keywords: climate crisis ; digital tracking ; disease mapping ; Drawing ; empathy ; geography ; Google Earth ; John Snow ; LSHTM ; pandemic ; planetary health ; proximity and distance ; subjectivity ; tele-technologies ; translation