The graphic essay Toxic Inheritance by anthropologist Amelia Fiske in collaboration with graphic designer Jonas Fischer gives intimate insights into the effects oil extraction in the Ecuadorean rainforest. This essay is featured in the virtual exhibition Toxic Relationships: Uncovering the Worlds of Hazardous Waste.

While English satire magazines mocked vegetarianism since the 1840s, the first German caricatures appeared some 30 years later. Early drawings often imagined that a vegetarian would gradually transform into a plant. Other recurring topics are the assumed correlation between (meatless) nutrition and (peaceful, fragile) physical appearance and character, as well as the debate over whether a meat-rich or a meat-free diet was better for human health. This is from the German version of “Satirical Glimpses of the Cultural History of Vegetarianism.” For the English-language version of this exhibition, click here.

Since vegetarian societies began to spread and organize events in Germany, their missionary attitude and their supposed moral superiority have been ridiculed. Caricatures mocked the rigid rules of the vegetarians and their societies, accusing them of hypocrisy or of reinterpreting the self-imposed prohibitions according to their own needs and weaknesses. This is from the German version of “Satirical Glimpses of the Cultural History of Vegetarianism.” For the English-language version of this exhibition, click here.

Since the mid-nineteenth century, vegetarianism and veganism have attracted public attention and provoked controversial discussions in Europe. The exhibition traces the development of the discourse on vegetarianism in caricatures, satirical drawings and poems that mock the movement, its worldview, social structures, and eating habits.