About this collection

What do the Altamira cave, the spinning jenny, the scanning tunneling microscope, the telephone, and the Apollo mission have in common? One, these items and events are on display at the Deutsches Museum, and two, they represent important milestones that have paved the way to a new geological “age of humans.”

Unfortunately, many of the objects representing historical Anthropocene milestones are on permanent display at the Deutsches Museum and cannot be removed. With this in mind, Henning Wagenbreth, a professor of illustration in visual communication at the University of the Arts (UdK), Berlin, and his students bring us closer to these revolutionary innovations by illustrating them in 30 eight-panel comic strips.

This project, completed with the editorial work of Alexandra Hamann, the academic supervision of Reinhold Leinfelder, and professional guidance of Helmuth Trischler, presents in a creative way the increasingly significant geological footprints of humans on the planet. The comics strips were on display from 5 December 2014 until 31 January 2016 alongside the actual objects exhibited at the Deutsches Museum, in cooperation with the Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society, in the special exhibition “Welcome to the Anthropocene: The Earth in Our Hands”.

They have also been published in German on the website of the Deutsches Museum and as a book accompanying the Anthropocene exhibition. To read the comics in English, please browse through the Anthropocene Milestones collection in the Multimedia Library of the Environment & Society Portal. The comics have been translated by Oliver Liebig and edited by Iris Trautmann and Marielle Dado.

Showing 16–30 of 30 results
Linotype
Reh, Eric
1884
Mining
Wang, Ruohan
1880
Altamira Cave
Gruber, Marcus
1879
Telephone
Sommerfeldt, Anders Emil
1861
The Bessemer Process
Zahrádková, Klára
1856
Shaft Drill
Lichtenwagner, Hans
1800
Theodolite
Koppelkamm, Leo
1800
Solar Energy
Artz, Sophie
1767
The Spinning Jenny
Bassen, Milena
1764
America and the Transatlantic Triangular Trade
David-Spickermann, Daniela
1700
Machine Tools
Chassignet, Marina Porras
1700
The Steam Engine
Chassignet, Marina Porras
1700
Mass Spectrometry and Geological Eras
Korniyenko, Nika
Robotics
David-Spickermann, Daniela
Biotechnology
Lukat, Till