Comics artists are both authors and visual artists. How do text and image relate in their work? What happens in the blank space between images? Those and other issues con-
stitute the secret of comics, also referred to as the ‘ninth art’. Employed by architects, comics art can become an efficient form of applied art: buildings are brought to life, their real or fictional inhabitants reveal the stories ‘behind’ the architecture. In May 2016, the House of Architecture in Graz hosted an exhibition on the surplus value of graphic novels in architectural education and practice. This catalogue invites to a further reflection on this theme.