I am a comic essayist and artistic researcher. I like projects that weave together fuzzy life experiences or research on society and technology with art, imagination, and emotions — beyond fear and clichés. I also give talks and workshops on these themes, and on how to communicate complexity within six panels. If you’d like to collaborate, feel free to reach out: hello@docjsnyder.net.
I am particularly drawn to the spaces in between: between image and text, intuition and intellect, science and art, AI and society, social analysis and poetry. These in-between spaces are where I work and play. I explore them by drawing on my background as a senior researcher and consultant in labor and innovation economics, and AI with my love for graphic novels (also known as comics), complex issues, art, craft, utopias, humor, and the many species of life on our planet.
(How it all began? I started making comic essays in 2018 when I noticed that many people I was giving advice to about AI (or algorithmic pattern recognition, data and statistics) were panicking for all the wrong reasons. At first, I thought about writing a book. But then, one night, I realized: as a comic/graphic novel lover, I just had to make a comic. Only: I couldn’t really draw. (And I know what you’re saying, anyone can draw, but people who really can know what I mean). I started anyway. And to this day, I rarely do the visual art, but think, research, conceptualize and write about complex topics and like to collaborate with artists. Often the result is a comic essay, sometimes an exhibition, a mural, a short film. Often also as a reading, talk or workshop about the topics that interest me: the content of my comics, often AI and society, and how to communicate complicated things through simple sentences and pictures aka science communication).
I am grateful that my work has a wide reach: it has been exhibited in museums and science centers such as the ZKM, Futurium, Deutsches Museum, Zeppelin Museum, Universum Bremen and Deutsches Technikmuseum Berlin, presented at festivals, at universities, at the Goethe Institute or as part of the Year of Science. It has also been exhibited internationally, discussed at conferences, shared on social media, picked up in podcasts and yes, even shown on television, e.g. in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and Süddeutsche Zeitung, on ARTE and ZDF, on Deutschlandfunk Kultur, radioeins, SWR, BR or NDR. (Mugs and T-shirts are still missing though).
In 2024, I also co-curated the travelling exhibition AI, What’s Up? (2024–2029), which carries the debate on artificial intelligence into public space across Europe.
Current Projects
>> Lynch, Kafka, die IBB und ich (Lynch, Kafka, the IBB and I – A Personal Comic Essay Account). A humorous yet critical take on bureaucratic challenges, inspired not only by Lynch and Kafka, but also by my personal experience with the IBB (Investitionsbank Berlin, Berlin’s investment bank) (2025, 10 p., in German). The comic was even shared by the Berlin Police and Citizen’s Representative’s official page – one of my best landing pages so far, according to independent voices.
>> Klimawandel und Strafrecht: Wer wird eigentlich bestraft? —- Ein Comic-Essay, with Maren Burkhardt (2025, 2 p., in German)
>> Proof of Work – A Comic Essay on How to Build on Every Talent, with Miriam Beblo and Zoe Brandcyk (scheduled for November 2025, appr. 30 p., in English)
>> KI nachhaltig entwickeln? Seegurke sucht Seegraswiese (Developing AI Sustainably? Sea Cucumber Seeks Seagrass), with Pauline Cremer, Marcus Voß and KI-Ideenwerkstatt für Umweltschutz (2024, 4 p., in German, also as Giant Exhibit in the rooms of KI-Ideenwerkstatt and as a folding poster, funded by the Federal Environment Ministry)
>> Altern, or: One day, baby, we’ll be old (Ageing, or: One day, baby, we’ll be old), with Pauline Cremer and in cooperation with Deutsches Zentrum für Altersfragen (DZA) (2024, 3 p., in German)
>> Absurdität für Deutschland—Ein Comic Essay (2024, 7 p., in German) & Absurdity for Germany (2024, 7 p., in English)
>> KI-Box Klima (AI Box Climate), 1000 + 25 educational kits for young people, carried out by Kosmos b e.V. and TüftelLab and supported by the Federal Environment Ministry (2024 and 2025). The box includes all four of my AI comics: We Need to Talk, AI (2019, with Lena Kadriye Ziyal), Schokoroboter und Deepfakes (2022, with Nele Konopka and Kristina Laube), A Pigeon’s Tale (2023, with Pauline Cremer, Marcus Voß, and Birds on Mars) and KI nachhaltig entwickeln? Seegurke sucht Seegraswiese (2024, with Pauline Cremer, Marcus Voß , Clara Isakowitsch and KI-Ideenwerkstatt für Umweltschutz)
>> AI, What’s Up? (KI, was geht?), co-curation and content for an exhibition about AI, in cooperation with Science Center Universum Bremen: wall comics for the Blackbox AI, and comic films to think about AI in the Thinktank, with Archimedes Agency (2024-2029, in German, English and French, other partners: experimenta, Heilbronn, AHHAA, Tartu, Musée de l’Air et de l’Espace, Le Bourget)
>> A Pigeon’s Tale -‒ A Comic Essay on Artificial Intelligence and Sustainability, with Pauline Cremer, in cooperation with Marcus Voß and Birds on Mars (2023, 12 p., in English and German, also available for purchase as a German print edition)
Other works
Book-length comic essays
>> Schokoroboter und Deepfakes -‒ Ein Comic-Essay über Künstliche Intelligenz aus der Perspektive von Jugendlichen (Chocolate Robots and Deepfakes ‒ A Comic Essay on Artificial Intelligence from the Perspective of Teenagers) with Nele Konopka and Kristina Laube in cooperation with the Tübingen AI Center and the Bundeswettbewerb Künstliche Intelligenz (2022, 80 p., in German, also available for purchase as a print edition)
>> The Non-Fungible Comic -‒ A Comic Essay about Non-Fungible Tokens, with Noëlle Kröger (2022, 56 p., in English and German, also available for purchase as a print edition)
>> Money Matters -‒ A Comic Essay about Money, with Pauline Cremer and Miriam Beblo (2021, 164 p., in German, also available for purchase as a print edition)
>> We Need to Talk, AI ‒- A Comic Essay on Artificial Intelligence, with Lena Kadriye Ziyal (2019, 56 p., in English, German (KI, wir müssen reden – Ein Comic Essay über Künstliche Intelligenz), Turkish, Spanish, Russian, Slovenian and Czech, also available for purchase as a print edition and as open online course)
>> The Corona Scribbles, a Comic Column about Life in times of Corona, on 1E9 magazine (April 2020-May 2023, 31 episodes, in German)
Shorter comic essays
>>Coworker or Overlord? -‒ A Comic Essay about ChatGPT+, with dall-e-2 and ChatGPT (2023, 2 p., in English)
>> The Big Third and the Blockchain -‒ A Comic Essay, with Fall e-2, inspired by Katrin Becker (2022, 12 p., in English), release 2023 on 1E9
>> Overcoming the Flaschenhals -‒ Ein Comic-Essay zu neuen Computing-Konzepten (Overcoming the Bottleneck ‒ A Comic Essay on New Computing Concepts) with Noëlle Kröger in cooperation with the German Federal Agency for Disruptive Innovation (2023, 3 p., in German)
>> AI in a Biased World, comic essay and artistic research project for the South African University of Stellenbosch’s Journal HERRI, Special Theme AI in Africa, illustrated by an AI to use the BIAS inherent in the algorithm, curated by Vulane Mthembu (2023, 1 p., in English)
>> Urheberrechte, oder: On the Shoulders of Giants – A Comic Essay about Copyright, with Karina Filusch, Eric Eitel and Nele Konopka (2022, 3 p., in German)
>> #teilenstattsplitten ‒- ein Comic über das Ehegattensplitting (a Comic Essay about German Tax Splitting for Spouses), with Pauline Cremer, Miriam Beblo, Jutta Allmendinger, Janina Kugel and Monika Schnitzer, in cooperation with the Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung (2021, 3 p., in German)
>> Abtreibung -‒ ein Comic Essay, with Maren Burkhardt (2020, 2 p., in German)
On this subpage, you’ll find three of my most important comic essays in German.
Other projects
>> ChatGPT Bullshit Bingo on LinkedIn (2024, 1p., in English)
>> AI 🐂💩 Bingo ‒- A playful intervention for panels, keynotes and workshops on Artificial Intelligence, with Katrin Fritsch and Theresa Reimann-Dubbers (2022, 4 variations of cards, in English)
Exhibitions: My comics have been part of some beautiful exhibitions, including: Futurium Berlin; Zeppelin Museum Friedrichshafen; Deutsches Museum Bonn; ZKM | Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe; Long Night of Science in Dresden and Berlin; I AM A.I. Exhibition. And I curated the exhibition „Whats up, AI.“
Sample press coverage
KI nachhaltig entwickeln? Seegurke sucht Seegraswiese – ein Comic über KI und Umweltschutz
Altern, oder: One Day, Baby, We Will Be Old: Comic über das Älterwerden—anlässlich 50 Jahre DZA
Introducing “A Pigeon’s Tale”
Exhibition at ZKM Karlsruhe: the intelligent.museum is around the corner
AI and the Future of Education – Panel Discussion
✨ ✨ ✨ “NFT’s are down, AI looms: How can creatives keep their cash flowing?”
Interview on AI and its impact on society
KI und seine Bedeutung für die Kreativwirtschaft
New Release: Coworker or Overlord? A Comic Essay about ChatGPT+
Overcoming the Flaschenhals
Release: Schokoroboter und Deepfakes – Ein Comic Essay über Künstliche Intelligenz aus der Perspektive von Jugendlichen
Review and Release: Copyright, or On the Shoulders of Giants
“The Big Third and the Blockchain” – A Comic Essay
Release: Non-Fungible Comic – A Comic Essay on Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs)
Interview with CCB Magazine
Talk at txt_conference
Release and Exhibition of Non-Fungible Comic
Exhibition of the Non-Fungible Comic
AI 🐂💩Bingo
Artist Talk on our Non-Fungible Comic
Collaboration: Campaign against joint tax deductions for married couples (“Ehegattensplitting”)
Release: Money Matters – A Comic Essay about Money
Interview
Tenemos que Hablar, IA
Exhibition and Discussion at the “AI-Camp 2019”
Panel Event at Museum of Work, Hamburg: The Genuinely Human – Artificial Intelligence and Creativity
Colloquium on “Artistic Intelligence”
- Eric Eitel
- Pauline Cremer
- Miriam Beblo
- Noëlle Kröger
- Nele Konopka
- Lena Kadriye Ziyal
- Sebastian Schneider
- Iris Röll
- 1E9
- Ann Bahrs
- Katrin Becker
- Katrin Fritsch
- Theresa Reimann-Dubbers
- Maren Burkhardt
- Karina Filusch
- Birds on Mars
- Tübingen AI Center
- KI-Campus
- Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit – atingi
- Bundeswettbewerb Künstliche Intelligenz
- Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung
- Bundesagentur für Sprunginnovationen – SPRIN-D