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An Exercise in Reimagining Space
12026-02-19T15:47:46-05:00Anastasiia Pereverten1dee3aa5075817eb04077dbae88a1030d7d4ebb491What if we set aside what we knew about how the Russian Empire looked? What if we erased the boundaries and roads, and imagined it instead as a continuous space? This week we are back to playing with data from the Geographical Atlas of the Russian Empire produced in the 1820s. We found the midlines between the 12,203 settlements shown there and used those shapes as the base layer. Then we calculated the distance from each of those spaces to the nearest post station. Why? Because a post station was a meaningful connection to a broad network of mobility: of goods and people and animals and news. As you can see, the clustering pattern varies constantly, whispering suggestions about population density, topography, and routes. The story lines aren’t always clear. They challenge our idea of what we know and what is familiar. They leave a lot to the imagination. And maybe that’s just what we all need as we head into a new year.plain2026-02-19T15:47:46-05:00Anastasiia Pereverten1dee3aa5075817eb04077dbae88a1030d7d4ebb4
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12026-02-19T12:59:49-05:00Paul Vadanf46fd2a7a6d2ab1ecca0ec13c84118eaf61facfaMap of the Week GalleryAnastasiia Pereverten39structured_gallery2026-02-27T13:24:14-05:00Anastasiia Pereverten1dee3aa5075817eb04077dbae88a1030d7d4ebb4