Zaplatit zemi – Sacco Joe (2022)

In the wide valley of the Mackenzie River, the Dene have lived as they describe since time immemorial. The Dene feel that they belong to the land and not the other way around – the land is crucial for their livelihood and their way of life. However, the Northwest Territories of subarctic Canada also contain valuable natural resources, including oil, gas, and diamonds. With extraction came jobs and investment – but also the construction of roads, pipelines, and toxic waste that scarred the landscape, along with alcohol, drugs, and debt that drastically transformed the lifestyle of the indigenous people. In the comic Paying the Land, Joe Sacco travels through the frozen North and finds people struggling to cope with the contradictory consequences of industrial development and the immeasurable losses of a brutal colonial legacy. Against the backdrop of vast and beautiful landscapes, where people appear tiny, Sacco interviews trappers and chiefs, activists and priests, and then tells an expansive story about money, addiction, loss, and culture, with stunning visual details that we have long come to appreciate from this great comic reporter.