A Carnival of Revolution
For centuries, the archetype of the Trickster has infiltrated cultures around the world. Many remember the heros of fables, but fewer seem to remember the tricksters that played pivotal roles in toppling the communist regimes of Central Europe in the late 20th century.
Below is an account of one such trickster’s travels through Central Europe that led tot he toppling of the Communist regimes of the 20th century.
This pictorial map highlights the scenes or cities where peaceful and playful demonstrations took place leading up to the toppling of Communist regimes in Eastern Europe. Frequent attention is given to the more serious and distressing protests and events that lead to the upheaval of Communism, but this map seeks to highlight the more joyous, promising, and often overlooked demonstrations. Inspired directly by Padriac Kenney’s 2002 book A Carnival of Revolution, it lays out 16 scenes of peaceful and entertaining protests and demonstrations that took place in the last few years of Communism in Eastern Europe.
The cities and information about the events were sourced from Kenney’s book.Contemporary boundaries were sourced from Natural Earth data and 1988 boundaries were sourced from open-source maps on Wikimedia Commons. The remaining city, land, and water shapefiles were sourced from Natural Earth. The building illustrations were sourced from Adobe Stock, and the dwarf illustrations were digitized by the author in the style of Orange Alternative graffiti.
As a pictorial map, it focuses on emotions and real-world experience, rather than spatial accuracy. While all underlying geography layers are spatially accurate, little emphasis is put on labels and terrain, but rather on events and experiences. The viewer is meant to get lost in the map and not necessarily focus on an outright visual map. They should be able to view the map, its illustrations, and quotes and dissect them as they see fit before diving into the accompanying information.
In terms of whether or not this map was successful, more time to build out the full picture of emotional landscapes would be beneficial. It offers a snapshot into the emotions and perceived landscapes of the movements of the Eve of the October Revolution happening. Since I have replicated the information culminated by an academic, I hope I have done a sufficient job of using their framework to illustrate this series of events. My additional use of illustrations in the style of the Orange Alternative bolsters the efforts of the original author to visualize this episode leading up to the fall of Communism in Eastern Europe.