Monique van Dongen (1965) loves creating visual stories based on real events - from the present or the past - featuring real characters with desires, struggles, and emotions. She studied visual communication at art school and film and television studies at Utrecht University, and later moved into the field of communication. In the Visual Storytelling programme at Venster Academy (https://www.vensteracademy.com/), everything came together: a fascination with an event, doing research, building a narrative, drawing, and writing - all things Monique finds deeply enjoyable. She decided to continue doing so. Het zwijgen van Jaap is her first graphic novel, she is working on her second.