Regular Joe

The first few panels of “Rockin’ Rose City,” a comic strip for Willamette Week, where Sacco satirized the burgeoning Portland music scene in the aftermath of the grunge explosion from Seattle. Who doesn’t love jokes about Satyricon? It continues in the next picture.

“Rockin’ Rose City” continues as Joe goes through the Portland scene.

This bit, taken from But I Like It, has Sacco in the midst of a tour through Europe with his friend Gerry Mohr’s band, the Miracle Workers. Here, Sacco freaks out at his lack of success with the local women compared to that of the band.

Sacco spent two years living in Berlin making rock posters that ended up plastered all over underpasses and walls around Germany. During this period he could get into any Berlin club he wanted without paying. “I seriously considered changing my name to ‘Joe Plus One,’” says Sacco in But I Like It.

This page, taken from Notes From a Defeatist, details some of the harrowing experiences suffered by Sacco’s mother on Malta during World War II, as the Italians air raided the island.

The top detail of “More Women, More Children, More Quickly,” featuring a quote from former British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin.

In Safe Area Gorazde, Edin, the book’s protagonist, attempts to defend his town from Serbian tanks on their way toward the city.

Palestine Sacco’s breakthrough book, originally was released as a limited comic series of nine issues before it reached its greatest success as a collection in the form of a graphic novel. These full-color pictures were the covers of each issue.

In this sequence from Palestine, Sacco rides with representatives from the United Nations Relief and Works Agency through a Palestinian refugee camp, showing three slices of life in the Gaza Strip.

Sacco is introduced to the geography of Sarajevo before checking in at the Holiday Inn where he meets with Neven in The Fixer.

This excerpt from the profile “Soba,” depicts the title character (far to the right, next to the speaker) holding court in a Sarajevo rock club, after spending time in the military disarming mines.

This chaotic page is from Sacco’s newest work, Footnotes in Gaza. Here, men try to make their way into a school in Rafah as Israeli soldiers bludgeon them.

A close-up detail of Sacco’s artwork in Footnotes in Gaza.

A slice of life from Footnotes in Gaza.

This page from Footnotes in Gaza illustrates what Sacco does best, finding humor wherever he goes while still remaining empathetic to his subjects.