Mythology

Alex Ross and Chip Kidd

Titan Books £16.99, pp310

Mention Gotham City, Metropolis or the Batcave, and the odds are you'll know what I'm talking about. You'll probably also have a vague mental image of these imaginary places and the characters who inhabit them. These creations are part of a collective mythology that spans generations, languages and continents. For 14 years, artist Alex Ross has been breathing new and vivid life into this familiar iconography, adding an unprecedented sense of realism and restoring its mythic allusions.

The aptly named Mythology gathers Ross's work for publishers DC Comics with pencil sketches and watercolours of the firm's most famous characters. His life-long affection for these heroes is obvious in his subtle and often neo-realistic depictions. And, oddly, the heightened attention to detail and use of familiar, real-world settings make the idea of a luridly costumed adventurer more potent, not less.

Charles Kochman, a DC Comics editor, explains Ross's preoccupation with realism and its consequences: 'We had many conversations about Wonder Woman, starting from the premise - what if she were real? How would people react to this strikingly beautiful woman fighting injustice wearing a revealing costume? How would she be perceived in some Third World country, wearing the colours of the American flag?'

In sketches drawn shortly before the 11 September terrorist attacks, we see her liberating hundreds of women from imprisonment by an 'oppressive regime' in an unspecified Middle Eastern country. Yet the Amazon is stoned by the burka-clad women, who are resentful.

This jarring of the real world and its heroic icons is explored throughout the book. Mythology is not just a chronology of nostalgia for those with a misspent youth. Nor is it merely an illustrated biography of one of the most accomplished commercial artists. It is also a reminder of a capacity for wonder that adults all too often lose.