Gesellschaft und Wirtschaft: Bildstatistisches Elementarwerk - Kohlenwirtschaft der Erde [14080.051]
The pattern
This still is filed under Data as proof.
Define
A chart, map, or count that is the argument, not an illustration next to the argument.
Mechanism
Sighted evidence. The reader is asked to believe their eyes: a bar, a share, a spread on a map.
Verdict
The claim is comparative or quantitative and the figure can be read without a caption doing the sell.
Why it works
Packing the symbols into tight rectangular blocks rather than scattering them lets the reader compare two regions as areas while still being able to count units, which keeps the honesty of the unit chart and adds the speed of a bar. Emptiness is used as evidence: the blank continents say as much as the two blocks, and the plate does not fill them to balance the composition. Colour is reserved for a single distinction, lignite against hard coal, so it reads as information rather than styling. The pick-and-shovel mark inside the symbol keeps the subject legible at a size where a literal drawing of coal would turn into a smudge.
Steal this when
Use this when concentration is the finding, and the empty space in your data is the argument. Packing units into rectangles instead of single rows is the move to copy whenever counts are too large for one line but you still want the reader able to verify them.