Science Goes Pop: The Whimsical Assemblage Art Edition

Houl and Britt Nichols in conversation with Dan Santos and Crystal Leigh-Clitheroe, introduced by Anna-Sophie Jürgens | Section: Visual Science Storytelling, Sequential Art & Illustrated Science Communication

Abstract: This article brings into dialogue two artistic responses to academic discourses on science and its surrounding cultural narratives. Houl and Britt Nichol’s artworks explore science through the lens of comics, artistic imagination and visual storytelling by framing and reflecting on scientific work (in progress) as both deeply personal and situated in cultural contexts. In Isolated and Restricted, Houl visually meditates on isolation in science, challenging the framing of legitimacy across formal and informal labs, drawing from Dan Santos’ conceptualisation of restricted scientific spaces – laboratories, garages and fantastical bat-caves. Nichol’s Vision of a Hopepunk Future draws on solar- and hope-punk to counter anxieties around biotech with optimism and care. Both pieces use visual metaphors and multimodal techniques to interrogate societal narratives about science, and propose visual languages that reimagine science as emotionally rich and radically hopeful. In their works, art becomes both a site of critique and a blueprint for scientific re-enchantment.

Preface by the Series Editors

 w/k’s series on “Visual Science Storytelling, Sequential Art & Illustrated Science Communication” explores the power of visual art in making complex scientific concepts more engaging and accessible to diverse audiences, as well as how popular visual art forms, such as comics, are vehicles and results of science-art collaborations. The series places particular emphasis on artistic concepts and provides insights into how different styles of visual art and creative expression excite our imagination about science. In 2025, the series inspired the “Science Goes Pop” project, which brought together six Canberra-based artists and six comics scholars to investigate science through comics and illustrations. This article is one of three exploring the art and insights that emerged from a collaboration where artwork was inspired by science-focused academic discussions and shared reflections.

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 How do we excite our imagination about science by bridging art and science through the medium of comics and illustration? How do visual artists conceptualise and convey meanings of science and science-focused cultural reflection through visual storytelling? Our interactive and collaborative “Science Goes Pop” project sought to spark interest in our cultural conceptions of science and inspire (new) understandings of the creative imagination surrounding science and research. It aimed to raise awareness of science within the community and beyond, foster public dialogue about science and encourage critical, research-informed thinking – all while creating and exploring new artworks by Canberra artists inspired by academic reflection. 

Researching visual imaginaries of scientific and technological futures

Crystal-Leigh Clitheroe’s “Science Goes Pop” talk examined the portrayal of bioengineering, synthetic biology and their practitioners in fictional comics and how they explore and envision the promise and societal impact of innovative biotechnologies. Currently, psychologically- and socially-dysfunctional superheroes characterise our pop cultural discourse of bioengineering in comics and their film adaptations – from The Avengers, The X-Men, The Watchmen to The Boys. Tapping into apocalyptic extinctions and technopocalypses – like in Y: The Last Man or The Walking Dead – they often include dystopian, eugenical representations such as those in Judge Dredd and Resident Evil. This discourse is consistent with analyses of representations of bioengineered bodies in science fiction films like Splice, Okja and GATTACA. Even optimistic references to bioengineering and transhumanism in science fiction consider them ‘darkly prophetic’ of a new era of medical innovations and gene therapies (Seedhouse 2014, 6); “a wondrous dream of power perpetually threatened with eclipse by an equally powerful nightmare” (Locke 2019, 269). Alternatively, these representations are dismissed as psychological release responses to the digital era information overload; “imaginative excesses performing an idiosyncratic eulogy at the funeral of physicality” (Taylor 2000, 1). Drawing on approaches from science communication, comics studies and cultural studies, Crys discusses the visual, narrative and metaphorical meanings that unfold between biotechnological processes, institutional settings and scientist characters, clarifying the extent and means by which science fiction comics challenge traditional scientist stereotypes and narratives of biotechnology. In this context, and considering the history of genetic engineering and biotechnology in popular culture and science communication discourses, we can explore positive and optimistic narratives that reframe bioengineering as a source of agency and hope, as do representations of renewable energy technologies in solarpunk aesthetics and narratives (Schönbohm & Hermann, 2024). Are there stories that showcase the potential of biotechnologies and life science innovations to help us envision sustainable futures? How do such futures play out in the pop culture medium of comics?

Studying science as context and content in graphic art

Dan Santos’ “Science Goes Pop” presentation focussed on stories about Batman, who engages in a range of scientific and technical exploits in order to wage his particular brand of vigilantism. It gauged a range of questions about the wheres and hows of Batman’s science. For example, if laboratories are typically seen as sterile and ordered spaces, what are we to make of the sombre and messy spaces where Batman practices his science, and the insights that emerge from them? If science is shaped by a range of collective norms – legal, ethical, epistemic – what are we to make of the insistently individualist nature of Batman’s scientific pursuits? The presentation did not offer any final answers, but instead gestured towards new lines of critical enquiry that are opened up if our gaze is trained more explicitly towards the contexts of science and the expectations and assumptions that shape how we think it ought to be conducted.

Dan Santos drew a distinction between the content of science and the contexts of science, and considered how stories in the DC Comics Universe represent this distinction and thereby raise broader questions about how science is undertaken. In popular cultural explorations of science, examining the content of science involves focussing on the knowledge and innovations made possible from technoscientific advances, and exploring both the optimistic hopes for these outputs alongside skepticism and concern. In looking at the content of science, what is typically foregrounded is what science produces, and its potential impacts on broader society. On the other hand, the contexts of science comprise the range of background settings and conditions which enable science to take place in particular ways. Importantly, these settings and conditions influence how others’ view the legitimacy and acceptability of the content of science. Contexts include, for example, the laboratories in which science is undertaken – from those run by clandestine biohackers to those overseen by corporate interests – to the regulatory institutions and collective disciplinary norms that shape ‘good’ science. Analysing how these contexts are represented in comics enables a series of questions to emerge about how science can, and should, be conducted in legitimate ways. This work is part of his broader research interest in examining the spaces of science-society relations.

So what ideas did two visual artists – Houl and Britt Nichols – take away from these two academic science-themed reflections, and what and how did they inspire their artwork? 

Art emerging from the pages of science-themed comics research

Houl – Witty assemblage

I love isolation. I love that time by myself, spent separate, adrift and unmoored, just doing my own thing. That’s when I’m most focused and most creative. One of the most salient ideas in Dr Dan Santos’ “Engineering Life in Laboratories: Snapshots from the DC Comics”, was his exploration of the isolated nature of the scientific process in relation to the restricted spaces that this takes place in. Whether this is a restricted laboratory – all crisp, clean and contained – the re-tooled garage of a biohacker or an underground cave that doubles as the workspace of a masked billionaire playboy with a leather fetish and is filled with prototype vehicles, giant currency and a giant mechanical Tyrannosaurus. My work, created alone in my makeshift studio, is an extension of my ongoing series of gifts, works to be left in public spaces for others to discover, relocate and, ultimately, rehome. It responds to the universality of Dr Santos’ exploration of the isolation within the process of scientific research and study, and sees a single figure floating as if in a vacuum against a shifting selection of diverse but equally empty and isolated backgrounds. Created from recycled cardboard, hand painted and cut out, my figure comes complete with removable mask and lab coat in an exploration of the relationships between those disparate individuals who work within formal scientific labs and those who exist outside these rigid, restricted spaces. Whether you have a smattering of letters after your name or not, there is a kinship in the sense of exploration and discovery that can never be truly realised as a result of the separation required. The fixed location of the figure in the middle of the varied empty backdrops in turn allows for a consideration of the similarity of action within the diverse places. These spaces, these labs, all exist in isolation, yet there is a universality of experience and experimentation, whose separateness is determined by restrictive settings, moral codes and, sometimes, legality.

Reflection by Dan Santos on Isolated and Restricted

Houl’s artistic response to my presentation hones in on a specific context in science – laboratories – and visually prompts a range of thought-provoking questions about where these spaces may legitimately be located, and what both connects and separates them as sites of experimentation, innovation and ultimately personal creativity and comfort. As such, the artwork plays around with and questions various boundaries. Picking up on my examinations of the inescapably individual nature of Batman’s scientific exploits, Houl ruminates on the personal and often isolated experience of doing science. Nevertheless, there is a playfulness to the cardboard figure’s pose that suggests that this isolation is not negative but instead necessary to scientific practice. Thus, far from being an activity characterised by objective stances and objectified practices, science is inextricably personal and private. 

However, there are limits to this, in that even though all scientific spaces are personal and private, these spaces are not all viewed in the same way. In different contexts, the figure is differently dressed – in conventional indoor lab spaces, the figure is wearing a conventional lab coat, whereas in unconventional outdoor lab spaces, the figure is more casually dressed. Such differences, as Houl explains, hint towards the ways in which differences are performed between “those disparate individuals who work within formal scientific labs and those who exist outside these rigid, restricted spaces.” There are norms and expectations, often institutionally governed and overseen, that distinguish between a ‘restricted laboratory’, a ‘re-tooled garage’ and an ‘underground cave’ and the people and practices found in them. These contextual factors highlight how even though science may be “a kinship in the sense of exploration and discovery, … [this kinship] can never be truly realised as a result of the separation required”. Ultimately, Houl’s artwork pushes us to think about the fringes of what is taken to be legitimate science, and to consider what both defines and distinguishes science as a particular type of (a)social activity.

Britt Nichols – Future layers

I see a future that’s defiantly joyful. A bold, messy, colourful Earth. Neither utopia or dystopia, but a stubborn middle ground. A place I’d choose to stay, even with all the other galaxies out there waiting. Most sci-fi futures are too shiny. They are high-tech and high-concept, cold and logical. The path we’re on at the moment is stripping fat for the aim of productivity, a world where everything exists for a purpose. Give me the fleshy, the breakable. An existing-for-the-sake-of it kind of world. So much of our future in sci-fi stories is somewhere else. Off-world, post-collapse. But, abandoning Earth is not very hopepunk of us. What if we took what we knew and loved, and fought for it? In this collage we brought the universe to us – the planets in the sky pulled closer to Earth, opening up the possibilities. A robot hand picks a planet, like a cherry from a tree. The ecosystem is rich and colourful. Bioengineering helped us regenerate and innovate our way back into balance. Birds are singing, fruit is fruiting and life is thriving. The environment is patched up, duct taped and in fine working order. At the centre is a woman, tending a seed vault. An attitude of care, preparation, and the kind of hope that actually does the work. Below her, the Earth’s core is layered with circuit boards and wires. The tech now built into Earth’s fabric is in service to its life. This piece is made from magazines destined for compost. A cocktail of old National Geographic and vintage Playboy, documenting the world’s beauty and culture and desire. They’ve been cut apart and reassembled into a future where nature reigns supreme, women are at the forefront and tech hums quietly in the background. This contradiction of vintage, analogue media to build a vision of the future is intentional. It’s messy. It’s human. It’s exactly what hopepunk is.

Reflection by Crystal-Leigh Clitheroe on Vision of a Hopepunk Future

Britt Nichols’ collage piece has artfully captured the essence of “hope-punk”. Hope-punk, coined by science-fantasy writer Alexandra Rowland in 2017, is both a genre and a philosophical stance that envisions active, collective resistance against blind cynicism, even when victory is temporary or uncertain. It is “punk” in the sense that it frames hope as defiance rather than naïve optimism, and this hope is enacted through everyday persistence and “the work is never done” narratives, where we approach the problems with our sleeves rolled up and a can-do attitude. The women in Britt’s collage are a bright and sassy form of punk, spiritually colourful, where the colour is from the “low-tech” of living beings that can self-renew, as opposed to shiny, high-tech futures, that ultimately fade and rust. Culturally, storytelling in sci-fi comics is as layered as the generations of technology in the collage; something extraordinary and new is continually emerging from the socially-critical cyberpunk becomes (retroactively) steampunk becomes biopunk and we end up at the solar-punk lineage of science fiction story-telling; “a rebellion against a rebellion” culminating in a hope-punk (Schönbohm & Hermann, 2024) world where women joyfully stand and dance at the forefront of new technologies. Hope-punk science fiction wants a better world, and insists on portraying our ‘messy’ world as worth saving and therefore possible to save. This nuanced perspective echoes in philosophical contexts as a “critical techno-optimism”, which acknowledges potential negative repercussions while maintaining that thoughtfully-deployed technologies can address significant challenges. Graphics like these play a huge role in the development of these genres; they have a unique way of showing and explaining science and technology in increasingly hopeful storytelling. Ways that are simultaneously cognitively complex and able to condense complex information or focus attention. The joyful, visual labour of the woman carefully curating the seedbank makes it more relatable and less mysterious, more doable, much like the hand plucking an accessible new world out of the air like a cherry. The whimsy in the other women’s movements brings to mind Aboriginal wisdom and advice about “stepping lightly” through the world, being aware of our footprint. Unlike conventional techno-optimism, the biotechno-optimism in this art is characterised by feminist approaches to technology that overlap with each other; biomimicry and cooperation with natural systems rather than domination; regeneration and circularity rather than extraction; democratic access to technologies; integration of biological systems that enhance biodiversity; and attention to biological scales and biogeographical cycles (eco-foresight and planning for the future). This project thus approaches the topic from the standpoint of hopeful storytelling and engaging science communication narratives of futures to be negotiated (by women!) instead of foregone scientific eventualities.

Popping up beyond the frame: Putting art up and bringing the universe to us 

In a 2023 w/k article, Canberra artist Houl wrote: “The medium of the artwork definitely dictates the amount of narrative or message that can be portrayed.“ How does the artistic medium of mobile and ephemeral artwork affect any potential science-related message? Will the message become fluid, evolve with its surroundings and audience interaction? A transient artwork – which may include street art, installations or paper-based collages – can shift in meaning depending on its placement, movement or eventual disappearance. Impermanence can add urgency; making the message feel immediate and fleeting, reinforcing themes of change, adaptability or social commentary. What happens if that medium is an assembled and layered composition, like a collage, that builds meaning through juxtaposition, allowing multiple interpretations and inviting viewers to engage with the connections between elements?  In the context of climate change research and education, collages have been shown to not only challenge perceptions, but also to stimulate new dialogues about climate science. They also enhance creative problem-solving approaches and help recognise interconnections and complexity (Jacobson et al., 2016). These techniques lead Houl to explore themes of isolation and institutional boundaries within scientific practice. Using recycled cardboard and removable symbols of authority – such as a lab coat and mask – the artwork interrogates questions of legitimacy and kinship across both formal and informal scientific domains, highlighting the universal-yet-fragmented nature of experimentation. In contrast, Nichols’ collage embraces the aesthetic of hope-punk, where hope functions as resistance and care becomes a radical gesture. Through vintage analogue media and vibrant imagery, the work rejects the sterility of high-tech visions in favour of a messier, emotionally-textured future. Both artworks employ visual metaphor and imaginative storytelling to reframe science as a creative, affective and socially-embedded pursuit.

References

“Science Goes Pop: Science, Comics and Illustrated Science Communication”, a Popsicule project of the Australian National University (2025). 

Jacobson, S. K., J. R. Seavey, and R. C. Mueller (2016). Integrated science and art education for creative climate change communication. Ecology and Society 21(3): 30.

Locke, S. (2019). With Great Power Comes Changing Representations: From Radiation to Genetics in the Origin of Spider-Man. In A. Görgen, G. A. Nunez, & H. Fangerau (Eds.), Handbook of Popular Culture and Biomedicine: Knowledge in the Life Sciences as Cultural Artefact (259–270). Springer International Publishing

Schönbohm, A., & Hermann, I. (2024). Dancing with Biopunks: Innovation in the Life Science Industry and Science Fiction. In Innovation in Life Sciences (Vol. 2525, 3–14). Springer Nature Switzerland. 

Seedhouse, E. (2014). Beyond Human Engineering Our Future Evolution. Springer. 

Taylor, P. (2000). Fleshing Out the Maelstrom: Biopunk and the Violence of Information. M/C Journal, 3(3), Article 3. 

 “Science Goes Pop” was supported by Inspiring Australia ACT and the ACT Government. The organisers would like to thank their sponsors and collaborators.

How to cite this article

Houl, Britt Nichols, Dan Santos, Crystal Leigh-Clitheroe and Anna-Sophie Jürgens (2025): Science Goes Pop: The Whimsical Assemblage Art Edition. w/k–Between Science & Art Journal. https://doi.org/10.55597/e10326