“Running in Both Directions”: The Reflective Character of Single-Image Narratives in Joe Sacco’s Graphic Journalism

Abstract

This article examines single-image narrative forms, demonstrating how they inform and problematize Joe Sacco’s works of graphic journalism. I analyze three different single-image narratives, the splash page, the spread, and the bleed, originally found in superhero and adventure comics, and show how they function in Joe Sacco’s Safe Area Goražde, The Fixer, and Palestine. Single-image narrative forms problematize visual reporting as suspended between involvement and distance. I investigate how Joe Sacco, a graphic artist and a journalist in one person, manipulates images which were originally conceived as “attention grabbers” for the comics reader so that they become a commentary on the ethics of journalism