What is Sequential Art?

Sequential art is a term for visual forms that use images in a deliberate order to tell a story or convey information. It appears most clearly in comics, manga, webtoons, and graphic novels, where panels guide the reader’s eye to build a narrative through contrasting and connected images, often supported by text. Coined by Will Eisner, the idea focuses on using a planned sequence of pictures (and sometimes words) to create meaning, movement, and emotion, making the space between panels just as important as the panels themselves for storytelling.