Batman a searching...

[jimlee]

Still digging through my various drives for sketches here and there. Here is one from last year which I did for the mother of a friend we were staying with in Gravina near the heel of southern Italy. The ancient town looks very similar to Matera which lies very close. That's the city where much of the Passion of Christ was filmed. Gravina looks very similar but hasn't done as well of a job of marketing and promoting itself and its treasures.

Gravina is famous for its many ancient grottos or caves lining its perimeter whose origins are not entirely known. They do date back to pre-Roman tribes. Like I said--very old.

Anyway, the joke of the sketch is that Batman is of course having trouble finding his own Batcave. Get it? Yeah, yeah, I plan on keeping my day job. The food in Puglia, the region where Gravina is located is awesome with some of the best green olives (and I rarely eat them otherwise), olive oils, herbs, cheese and wine you will find til...well, til you cross over into the next region of Italy! We would wake up late, get into our rental cars and hit either a lovely town like Matera or Altamura or Alberobello or just drive to the coast and swim in the blue Adriatic. I was on deadline during the trip so I would draw late into the night and even worked with shades on at the beach to make the deadline. We drove to Bari, the region's capital and largest city to fedex out the pages. Book came out on time too.

Here is a larger shot; it's not superclear as I shot it with my 2 megapixel camera.