The story

Cara Barer is an American photographer who bases her practice in Houston, Texas. Barer visually documents the way in which society has come to retrieve information by changing a common reference book into a work of sculpture. In her experimentation with curling irons, clothes pins and water, Barer transforms volumes of irrelevant and outdated information into coiled, crumpled objects of beauty.  

Cartographic 2015
With a deep interest in travel, maps and  guide books have been a part of Barer’s love for reference and printed information materials.Barer calls attention to the map,  its increasing  obsolescence, and how it is being abandoned for smart phones with a map app or a vehicle  equipped with  GPS for directions to find ones location. When I’m traveling I truly don’t feel that I know where I am unless I can see my location on a printed map. It gives me a secure feeling that I will never have from an electronic source.