Comics
It's About Time!
ARTIST
MARION DENGLER
A non-binary queer comic artist living in Berlin, trying to work as a freelancer. Likes the macabre and gothic horror. Main inspirations are Symbolism, Art nouveau and works from the golden age of illustration. Eerie, mysterious stuff with hidden meanings is my jam, which is why my stories and illustrations tend to veer into magical realism, if not outright fantasy. I grew up with Franco-Belgian comics, started reading manga after that and now primarily read American indie graphic novels, preferably with queer themes. Successfully blending these three different styles of comic art and narration is something I want to achieve in my own work.
Location
Berlin, Germany
Artistic Focus
Magical realism, gothic horror, fantasy
Contributions to LUX:plorations:
It’s About Time!
The Adventures of Tuwwo the Water Molecule
Becoming an Agent of Change
Why did you participate in LUX:plorations?
“During the comic festival at Contern in 2019, I was approached by Serge Haan who told me about the project and invited me to join in. I liked the focus on comics and the fact that this project would assemble most of the established luxembourgish comic artists in one project so as a newcomer, I would be in good company.”
What did you like most about LUX:plorations?
“I liked working with the University students on their stories since they gave me a lot of artistic freedom and trusted me on my decisions. At the same time their input was often crucial in guiding me in the right direction in regards to visuals, like clarity of message and so on. I liked that I was given a lot of free reign to make something that would be visually interesting as well as informational.”
What was the biggest challenge for you?
“The biggest challenge for me was also the most interesting aspect of the project: distilling a lot of information into 2 comic pages. While the university students had to work on the narrative, it befell to me to form said text into a visually clear and concise comic story. You can tell a lot through pictures alone so preferably one would want to keep the actual text in the comic as short as possible to let the pictures speak for themselves. That’s the challenge and whether or not I succeeded depends on the reaction of the readers.”
SCIENTISTS/AUTHORS
SUZANA CASCAO
Suzana is a researcher in Luxembourgish Contemporary History at the C2DH. Her doctoral research focuses on the late 19th early 20th century Esch-sur-Alzette, namely the social history of its upper classes.
Research Focus
Social History
Affiliation
Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History (C2DH)
University of Luxembourg
Contributions to LUX:plorations:
It’s About Time!
Why did you participate in LUX:plorations?
“I was passionate about comics and graphic novels that featured historical events and wondered whether we could try to have a go with our own subjects as a group.”
What did you like most about LUX:plorations?
“Seeing it become tangible, watching in awe the work of the artist Marion Dengler and how well Marion understood our project.”
What was the biggest challenge for you?
“Putting our group’s interdisciplinary ideas into two pages! Making the whole idea come across having the target audience in mind.”
DANIEL RICHTER
Daniel Richter is a PhD Student at the Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History, focusing on social history. In his thesis he tries to contribute to a better understanding of the various ways people living in different parts of the industrialized town of Esch during the first half of the 20th century organized their social and economic lives. He is also involved in producing a virtual exhibition for the European Capital of Culture 2022 Esch-sur-Alzette.
Research Focus
Social History
Affiliation
Contemporary history of Luxembourg,
Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History (C2DH)
University of Luxembourg
Contributions to LUX:plorations:
It’s About Time!
Why did you participate in LUX:plorations?
“I participated in LUX:plorations because it seemed like a fun project to work on and I saw it as a valuable experience for my interest in the field of public history.”
What did you like most about LUX:plorations?
“It offered a view into all the different subjects treated at the university which I would not have any close encounters otherwise. I liked that it forced us out of our own bubbles of terminologies and practices to try and find a common ground with other researchers and the public.”
What was the biggest challenge for you?
“The biggest challenge was laying aside the complex contexts and discourses hiding behind plain sentences to be able to tell a coherent narrative.”
AIDA HORANIET IBAÑEZ
“My research is about interdisciplinary historical data visualization. It is part of an Audacity project called “The Luxtime Machine”, whose main objective is to collect and visualize data from the fields of eco-hydrology, history, and environmental cheminformatics, to understand how to use data from the industrial past of the Minette region to study the impact of different exposures on the local population in a long-term perspective.”
Research Focus
Data visualization
Affiliation
Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History (C2DH),
University of Luxembourg
Contributions to LUX:plorations:
It’s About Time!
Why did you participate in LUX:plorations?
“Data analysis and data visualization, as well as collaboration between different disciplines, play a very important role in our society, and I hope that through comics, it will reach many more people in an entertaining way!”
What did you like most about LUX:plorations?
“The exchange with my colleagues, and how the artist made our story real.”
What was the biggest challenge for you?
“To tell the story in only two pages was the most challenging part, but thanks to the exchanges with the team, the artist and the coordinators, we managed to simplify it keeping the story meaningful.”
MENTOR
JESSICA BURTON
Jessica Burton is a researcher at the Luxembourg Centre for Contemporary and Digital History (C2DH), working on the relationship between European comic transfers in the 1960s within the Popkult60 project. She previously worked as a comic editor for Titan Comics, on titles such as Doctor Who, before embarking on her PhD. She is a mentor for LUX:plorations, wrote the comics “What is a Phd?” as well as “Zamara & Yso’s Space Odyssey” and teaches classes on comics history at the University.
Research Focus
Comics, History, Cross-cultural Transfers, Popular Culture
Contributions to LUX:plorations:
What Is a PhD?
Zamara & Yso’s Space Odissey
It’s About Time!
One Ome To Rule Them All
The Future Is Now
Beware the Eye in the Sky
Becoming an Agent of Change
Chronicles from Platform 6
Inside the Solar Cell
Microglia: Guardians of the Brain?
Why did you participate in LUX:plorations?
“I truly believe in the power of comics to inform and educate, so jumped at the chance to help fellow doctoral candidates learn how to tell their research through comics form.”
What did you like most about LUX:plorations?
“Watching the doctoral candidates work on their ideas and seeing them engage with the artists for an amazing end product.”
What was the biggest challenge for you?
“Finding the balance between suggesting ideas and allowing participants maximum creativity.”
SUPERVISOR
OLIVER GLASSL
Oliver Glassl is an educational management professional with long-term experience in academic teaching and curriculum development. His education includes degrees in speech and language therapy and business administration. His research in the field of neurorehabilitation has given rise to various publications. Currently working as a project manager at the Faculty of Science, Technology and Medicine at the University of Luxembourg, he is a member of the DESCOM team.
Work Focus
Educational Management
Contributions to LUX:plorations:
Modern Talking
It’s About Time!
Microglia: Guardians of the Brain?
Chronicles from Platform 6
Why did you participate in LUX:plorations?
“The world gets increasingly complex, also driven by science and research. It is therefore the responsibility of any research institution to make scientific knowledge available for lay audiences in an understandable way.”
What did you like most about LUX:plorations?
“I very much appreciated collaborating simultaneously with scientists and artists. Even though these fields might appear to be rather different on the first glimpse, they converge when it comes to the importance of creativity. Being part of this was a very inspiring experience.”
What was the biggest challenge for you?
“Waiting for the arrival of the boxes with the finished comics.”
Get involved!
Are you interested in history or data visualization? You might want to have a look at the following activities:
Learn more about the LuxTime Machine
Get involved in the public history projects of Esch2022 called HistorEsch
And finally you might want to check out the 2021 winners of the FNR Award for Outstanding Promotion of Science to the Public