A Wilderness of Rocks

Discover the University of Wisconsin collection of historic relief models, or three-dimensional maps.

The University of Wisconsin relief models were crafted from 1875-1943 at the dawn of the analytics age. Relief models are an extremely effective visualization tool. They help us intuitively understand big data sets and to create spatial awareness--the knowledge of relationships between objects, places and ourselves. Each relief model is shown in beautiful color photography. Learn their fascinating stories of expeditions and earthquakes, mountains and museums, bankruptcy and battlefields, governments and glaciers.