London artist celebrates the city's different nationalities with map drawn from passports

Stunning: the passport map of London
Yanko Tihov
Hannah Al-Othman12 October 2015

A London artist has created a new map that uses passports to showcase the capital's diversity.

Using information from the 2011 census, 38-year-old Yanko Tihov mapped the most common non-British nationalities in every London borough, depicting them as passport covers.

The piece, which the artist says aims to promote "hope and unity", shows the three or four non-British nationalities which are most prevalent in every borough.

A total of 32 different passport covers in deep blues, greens, and burgundies were used to create the striking patchwork, with the detail on the covers hand-painted in 23-carat gold.

The artist said friends of many nationalities who live in London had helped to provide the passport covers used in the artwork.

Mr Tihov, who also holds a Bulgarian passport, said he was inspired to create the piece after being awarded British citizenship, and receiving a second passport.

"That's how it came together," he told the Standard.

"I have two passports myself, and it came from receiving my second British passport."

He said moving from Notting Hill to Muswell Hill helped to inspire the artwork, as moving from one area of London to another can be "almost like moving to another country" due to the different nationalities who reside there.

"London is the only place where such a map could be really possible," he added, "Except possibly New York."

He told the Standard he is also working on a similar map of New York City, but wanted to produce the London version first because "London is what is in my heart, after living in this wonderful city for the past 15 years."

"Having this freedom to move and travel, I believe artists push the future ahead of them. They bring hope and unity to a world that needs their vision."

He said he was "very surprised" by some of his findings when researching census data ahead of producing the map.

"I was very surprised by Notting Hill, where I lived, in Kensington and Chelsea", he said. "You are a perception from reading the news and the people you meet, but it's often not the case.

"You read about wealthy Arabs, but the biggest nationality in Kensington was Americans, then French."

The artist said he is now working on a series of maps using census data dating back to World War Two, which will show how diverstiy in the capital has changed over time.

"I plan to do a historical sequence of London passport maps," he said.

"This will be the first of a sequence, to see how diversity changes."

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