Excerpts from Joe Sacco's 'Palestine' - seattlepi.com. EDITOR'S NOTE: This weekend, Seattle's Fantagraphics Books is celebrating the release of the collected "Palestine," Joe Sacco's remarkable comic book documenting that profoundly violent war zone after a visit there in 1991-92.
Born in Malta, raised and based in Portland, Sacco has become one of the most well-respected comic book artists of his generation, winning all the big grants, and spoken of as a successor to Art Spiegelman. But in many ways Sacco is not a successor to anyone. In the case of "Palestine," one can't call him a "graphic novelist," because this is real reporting. He is an observer, a witness: He offers no solutions and no relief from the harsh world he is documenting. He is a self-described "war junkie" who recently traveled to Iraq, much to the dismay of his friends and family. What follows are excerpts from the introduction to the collected "Palestine" written by Mideast scholar Edward Said ("Orientalism"). -- Emily White Arts and Entertainment editor. Joe Sacco's 'The Great War' Is Powerful Evocation of an Awful, Awful Day.
“You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you.
. ” – Leon Trotsky Joe Sacco is a comics artist who doesn’t shy away from harsh realities; if anything, he seeks them out. In previous books like Palestine, Footnotes in Gaza and Safe Area Gorazde, Sacco has used the comics medium to explore the atrocities of war and occupation in Palestine and the former Yugoslavia. In his comic-journalistic works, he often places himself as a character, standing in for, or at least alongside, the reader. The Great War continues the trends in Sacco’s past work while simultaneously usurping them. Except that Sacco being Sacco, there’s more to this project than a simple “war is hell” narrative.
Sacco has chosen to represent this day in a single, accordion-style foldout. 'A matter of justice': Joe Sacco on the Suez war, Gaza, and his future work. A cell from Joe Sacco’s Footnotes in Gaza shows Sacco (left) interviewing one of his many subjects.
From Palestine to Bosnia, journalist Joe Sacco has seen a lot. He’s also written a lot. And last but not least, he’s drawn a lot. The author of a number of books, the latest of which is Footnotes in Gaza, Sacco has earned numerous awards for his work. Footnotes in Gaza, which was praised in the pages of Time magazine, the New York Times, the Forward and more, chronicles two forgotten massacres commited by the Israeli army in the Gaza Strip during Israel’s brief 1956 occupation of the Strip. Also remember, when you make a donation of $100 or more to Mondoweiss during our December Fundraising Drive you can receive a copy of Footnotes in Gaza (thanks for your support).
I recently caught up with Sacco for a phone interview on Israel/Palestine, comic-style journalism, his future projects and more. Alex Kane: For Mondoweiss readers who may not know, tell me about yourself and your work. AK: Right. Joe Sacco's Great War graphic tableau becomes giant Paris metro poster. Joe Sacco's epic, 24-ft-long depiction of the first day of the battle of the Somme has been recreated on the wall of the Paris metro.
Published last autumn, the acclaimed cartoonist's wordless panorama The Great War picked out the events of the first world war battle, which began 98 years ago on 1 July, from the British soldiers who went over the top, to the mass burials of the dead. It drew glowing reviews on publication. Steve Rose called it "a cross between Hergé and the Chapman brothers; the Bayeux Tapestry as a silent movie" in the Guardian. Sacco himself has said the work was inspired by the Bayeux Tapestry. "It all started when I was playing darts with a friend of mine in New York," he told AFP.
Now the comic is being shown in the Montparnasse metro station in Paris in a display which runs to 130 metres. He told Le Monde that the fresco was trying to show "the scale of what happened that day". Joe Sacco’s “The Great War” Joe Sacco’s latest work, “The Great War,” a twenty-four-foot-long panorama that folds like an accordion, illustrates the first day of the Battle of the Somme, one of the bloodiest battles in history, which took place on July 1, 1916.
The Maltese-American cartoonist is best known for his comics journalism, including works like “Palestine,” “Safe Area Goražde,” and “Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt” (his 2012 New York Times best-selling collaboration with Chris Hedges), but “The Great War” is a purely visual work, homing in on a specific moment in history. We spoke with Sacco about his approach. When I got a call from an old friend of mine, an editor at Norton, asking me to draw a panorama of the Western front, my first response was “No!” Being a cartoonist, I always think in terms of narrative—but I grew up on Australia, and there the First World War truly gives Australians a sense of national identity.
I don’t feel a separation from the people I read about in history books.