Places & Spaces: Mapping Science

Places & Spaces: Mapping Science is a science exhibition that aims to demonstrate the power of maps to analyse, organize, and visualize abstract intellectual spaces. The exhibit showcases high-resolution maps that represent complex data in a visually understandable format. The maps featured in Places & Spaces were created by a global collection of experts in the fields of scientometrics, the natural, physical, and social sciences, visual arts, socio-political policymaking, and the humanities. By the end of 2014, the exhibit had collected 100 maps and various additional elements. The latter include Ingo Günther's Worldprocessor Globes, an illuminated diagram display, the Gapminder Card Game, hands-on science maps for kids, and the award-winning short film Humanexus.

Each year, the exhibition's international advisory board hosted a competitive selection process to choose ten new maps focused around a central theme. The ten iterations, each of which collecting ten maps, were published in three books, along with several macroscopes collected by the exhibit:

1st Iteration (2005): The Power of Maps

2nd Iteration (2006): The Power of Reference Systems

3rd Iteration (2007): The Power of Forecasts

4th Iteration (2008): Science Maps for Economic Decision Makers

5th Iteration (2009): Science Maps for Science Policy Makers

6th Iteration (2010): Science Maps for Scholars

7th Iteration (2011): Science Maps as Visual Interfaces to Digital Libraries

8th Iteration (2012): Science Maps for Kids

9th Iteration (2013): Science Maps Showing Trends and Dynamics

10th Iteration (2014): The Future of Science Mapping