MAPPAMUNDI, 2004, GULAMMOHAMMED SHEIKH (B.1937), WOOL, COTTON 3.03 X 3.60 M, VICTORIAN TAPESTRY WORKSHOP (WEAVERS CHERYL THORNTON, CAROLINE TULLY, RACHEL HINE AND AMY CORNALL). COLLECTION: UNIVERSITY OF MELBOURNE - TAASA Review December 2019

MAPPAMUNDI, 2004, GULAMMOHAMMED SHEIKH (B.1937), WOOL, COTTON 3.03 X 3.60 M, VICTORIAN TAPESTRY WORKSHOP (WEAVERS CHERYL THORNTON, CAROLINE TULLY, RACHEL HINE AND AMY CORNALL). COLLECTION: UNIVERSITY OF MELBOURNE – TAASA Review December 2019

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This article was originally found in the December 2019 edition of TAASA Review (Volume 28, Issue 4, Page 23).

The full article is available for free to TAASA Members.

The Ebstorf map, a wall hanging, had a sorry history after re-surfacing c1830 in a convent in Ebstorf in northwest Germany.

First, it had a section cut out; then it was incorrectly re-backed resulting in pigment loss; dismembered as part of an 1888 photographic campaign, and finally destroyed during the Allied bombing of Hanover on 8-9 October 1943 (Kupfer in Sambrani 2019: 279). Beginning in 2002-03, Sheikh developed his Mappamundi Suite using digital technology that allowed him to manipulate and aggregate images, both his own and borrowed , `…placing ostensibly incompatible images side by side to create a final work that highlights its parts as much as the whole, emphasizing the harmony of differences’ (Parsons in Sambrani 2019: 273). The Mappamundi Suite comprises 14 works on paper, each digital collage modified by Sheikh by over-painting with brush and gouache.

Mappamundi 3: Marichika [Mirage] served as the cartoon for the Mappamundi tapestry, as part of Sheikh’s collaboration in Melbourne in 2003 with the Australia-India Council, Asialink and the Victorian Tapestry Workshop...