Dr E.C.V. Talgorn (Elise)

Elise Talgorn is a multidisciplinary researcher, designer, and artist dedicated to creating positive futures through storytelling and art. From a young age, she was fascinated by both the mechanics of the world and the power of visual communication. While she solved Rubik’s cubes and drew comic strips as a child, today she studies sustainable system transitions and paints the emotions of change.

Elise has a diverse scientific and creative background. Between 1982 and 2004, she grew up in France, caricaturing teachers and studying renewable energy across Europe. She pursued an academic career in the Netherlands, where she earned her PhD in applied physics from Delft University of Technology in 2010, focusing on next-generation solar cells.

After completing her PhD, Elise worked as a senior scientist at Philips Research from 2011 to 2015, designing energy-efficient light installations and engaging in innovative sustainability-driven projects. In 2015, she transitioned to Philips Design as a senior strategist, where she worked on radical healthcare visions and circular transformations. In this role, Elise combined her expertise in systems thinking and narrative sciences to envision technological and strategic scenarios that promote digital health and well-being.

In parallel with her professional career, Elise developed her artistic practice. Since 2006, she has been an illustrator and painter for museums, private collectors, and newspapers. Her artwork engages emotionally and humorously with the more-than-human world, exploring themes such as climate change. One of her notable series, “Tsunami,” reflects on climate change from the perspective of water and its emotions. This creative practice offers Elise a vital space to connect with the beauty of the world.

In 2024, Elise embarked on a new challenge as an associate professor in Social Impact Storytelling at the Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences. In this role, she focuses on developing research and rolling out story-based methods that foster self-awareness, empathy, and collective creativity for societal change. Her work addresses complex social and environmental challenges such as inequality, loneliness, and ecological collapse. She aims to reconstruct societal and personal narratives to better align with collective well-being and sustainability.

Elise’s interdisciplinary approach is central to her work, integrating knowledge from physics, design, and arts, and collaborating with experts across fields such as ecology, biodesign, and behavior change. She draws on the universal language of storytelling to bridge different perspectives and create meaningful dialogue. Her specialities include facilitation of participatory story making, more-than-human storytelling, and storytelling for systems design.