Widerstand im Großen Walsertal: Entstehungsgeschichte und Reflexion von DELPHINA, einer erinnerungskulturellen Graphic Novel über das menschliche Handeln einer jungen Frau im österreichischen Vorarlberg

Abstract

This article provides a glimpse behind the scenes of a collaborative project whose centerpiece is a graphic novel about the Burtscher family’s acts of resistance during World War II. Set in the “Großes Walsertal”, a valley in the heart of Vorarlberg, Austria, the graphic novel tells the story of a young woman, Delphina Burtscher, the second youngest child of the family. After two of her brothers and her fiancé deserted during World War II, Delphina provided them with shelter and food. As a result, she was severely punished by the Nazi regime. The article traces how Delphina’s granddaughters, sisters Lydia Arantes and Sarah Kühne, developed their initial, tentative idea into an extensive interdisciplinary un dertaking involving descendants, artists, and historians from Austria and abroad. It presents historical data and contextual information, raises questions emerging from a commitment to collaboration rather than working in parallel, and offers insight into the negotiations around memory, experience, and artistic expression that are required among descendants, artists, and historians. Finally, the article gives a glance into the making of the graphic novel and reproduces first sketches which not only serve as the first illustrative testimonies of the story being told, but also capture the underlying process in multimodal form.