By combining research on maps, religion, and sexuality, Karl Whittington seeks to rescue Opicino de Canistris from his marginalization as the "psychotic artist" of the Italian Middle Ages. Whittington's dissertation in Art History, The Body-Worlds of Opicino de Canistris, Artist and Visionary (1296- ca. 1354), presents the first art-historical study of Opicino's works in over seventy years. In his triple role as artist, cleric, and scribe, Opicino combined expertise in drawing maps (mappaemundi and portolan sea-charts) with personal visions of God that he attributed to divine revelation. His art depicts fantastical bodies, which Whittington calls "body-worlds," that serve as topographical maps. Endowed with racial, moral, and gender identities (male, female, dual sexed, or androgynous), these bodyworlds convey both real and mystical or religious meanings. Whittington argues that Opicino's portolan charts also contributed to the development of linear perspective, though they depict light from God's point of view rather than the human eye.