greedily devours wind-turbine spaghetti with nuclear-tomatoes in an oil-sauce… it is a glutton and never satisfied. To recharge itself, it eats every form of energy without thinking about who pays the price…” This is how the designers Jonna Tuchtbeld and Erik Przkopanski describe the subject of their mural.
The artwork was created in the course Illustration at the Freie Schule für Gestaltung (FSG) in Hamburg-Wilhelmsburg, which started in August 2024. “In the course, the aim was to learn various analogue techniques in combination with digital tools in order to produce meaningful visual statements,” explained course instructor Gaby Bergmann. For the project Global Goals – locally designed, this offered a great opportunity to invite young FSG students to design a mural motif. The chosen topic was SDG 7: Affordable and Clean Energy for All!
Political scientist and human geographer Anna Fünfgeld provided the starting point with a brief and vivid introduction to the topic. Within only a few weeks, the course participants then developed motifs – alone or in teams – in which they condensed their ideas into “illustration.” “The project offered students the opportunity to become visible in public space with a socially relevant message and thereby generate impact. The challenge was the very short time frame for implementation. Since this topic is very meaningful for the younger generation, I was confident that the project could serve as a creative outlet and allow young voices to be seen visually,” explained lecturer Gaby Bergmann.
We would like to thank all participants whose designs can be seen here:
Each participant had the opportunity to present and discuss the motif they had developed. In the end, the “Energy Monster” with its stylized, boundless, and insatiable appetite was chosen for the mural banner. The image is one of four designs that Jonna Tuchtfeld and Erik Przkopanski created together.
“We decided on black and yellow for the colors because we thought it would attract the most attention. The style was meant to be ‘rough’ and in a ‘street art style’ to fit the Karolinen- and Schanzenviertel neighborhoods. And also because we are a bit part of the target audience ourselves…” the two designers explained. “It had to have a face, something personal, and clearly show that the monster greedily and recklessly consumes energy.”
When all participants presented their designs, it became clear how intensively they had engaged with the topic and how challenging it was to translate such a highly complex issue into visual language. Laura Pusback explained her work: “Even if we often skillfully ignore it, colonial structures have never disappeared, and the West still benefits from the exploitation of the Global South. This is also true in the green transition, as the resources often come from the Global South. Even for wind turbines, people are exploited during the extraction of the required resources.”
The glasses were also a prominent feature. Several designers used them in their illustrations to guide the viewer’s gaze from illusions to reality – our daily energy consumption. In different ways, their designs referenced our collective “energy appetite,” for example, through smartphone use and data consumption. “Glasses off – eyes open!” was the call to action.
Anna Fünfgeld accompanied the selection of the final motif: “It is not easy to reduce the complexity of this topic to a single image, and I think it was good that a clear decision was made to focus on one aspect of the theme.”
We thank all the students, instructors, and course leaders of the Freie Schule für Gestaltung, who embraced the character of the mural project: making the UN Sustainable Development Goals visible in Hamburg – using artistic means, involving different people to explore multiple perspectives, developing holistic ideas and visions, crossing boundaries, thinking freely and reorganizing, engaging all the senses, and allowing the irrational and ambivalent.