Engaging an aesthetics of the 'invisible' in graphic narratives to represent violence ethically

For  Zˇ izˇek  (Violence:  Six  Sideways  Reflections,  2008)  the  apparently  imperceptible
aspects of ‘objective’ violence perpetuate the cycle of visible, subjective violence. The 
representation  of  violence  –  itself  a  necessary  and  necessarily  brutal  process  – 
intimately  involves  one  in  ‘invisible’  violence.  Therefore,  the  search  for  an  ethical 
representation  of  violence  becomes  crucial.  An  ethical  representation  of  violence compels  
a  reconsideration  of  the  ‘invisible’  aspects  of  violence.  Approaching  the ‘invisible’  
aspects  of  violence,  while  still  preserving  their  indiscernible  qualities, requires such 
violence  to be represented indirectly. A close reading/viewing of two recent (2009) graphic 
narratives, Folman and Polonsky’s Waltz with Bashir: A Lebanon War Story and Joe Sacco’s Footnotes 
in Gaza, demonstrates the indirect representation of some ineffable aspects of violence. This 
representation differs from either ‘knowing’ or  ‘seeing’  violence.  In  this  representation  
categories  such  as  the  ‘visible’  and ‘invisible’ or ‘knowing’ and ‘seeing’ come to co-exist in 
dynamic tension, inflecting reality with obscurities and uncomfortable occlusions, while remaining 
a vital part of the quality of the experience of violence. This article argues that graphic 
narratives are particularly  well  placed  to  represent  ‘invisible’  violence  and  thus  provide 
 an  ideal example  of  an  aesthetic  form  that  is  able  to  approach  an  ethical  
representation  of violence.

...  speech does not simply express/articulate psychic turmoils; at a certain key point, psychic 
turmoils  themselves  are  a  reaction  to  the  trauma  of   ...   the  [‘invisible’]  torture   
...   of language [w]hat if ...  humans exceed animals in their capacity for violence precisely 
because they speak? (Zˇ izˇek              p.)