Franziska Stetter

Death and Denial

Death and Denial (also known under the name Viral Bane) Illustrates the denial of the realities during the pandemic, which led to suffering and death. The delusion and its grim tally are shown as cause and consequence of the same equation, visualized as a graph. This project shows the world-wide cumulative covid cases from January 2020 to January 2021 using related news headlines. The objective was to represent the contrast between the viral spread of denial and misinformation and its real-world impact on a viral pandemic. The result is an infographic, a collage, of hundreds of headlines commenting on the surge of Covid misinformation around the world. The lighter colored headlines in the background, arranged by date, are showing that the articles increased drastically from October to January. The exponential curve, visualized by darker colored headlines for contrast, show the gruesome toll of the disease, month by month and a more rapid increase the closer it gets to January 2021.
Death and Denial illustrates the cataclysmic absurdity of denying the existence of a major self-evident crisis, through a cacophony of lies, deception and rage.

The Projekt won a Gold Award at Graphis Poster Annual 2022 and is currently exhibited at the 27th International Poster Biennale in Warsaw 2021 at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw, Poland, 13 June–28 August, 2021.