STATUS: Current Exhibition
Until 26 May 2025
When an artist’s style earns him an epithet, it can be safe to say that he has reached the status of an icon. The term Burtonesque has come to describe anything dark and monstrous yet magical and endearing. It immediately evokes a set of gothic images and a dream-like atmosphere where fantasy and reality intertwine. The Design Museum celebrates film director Tim Burton and shows that there is much more to his skills beyond filmmaking.
The exhibition traverses his whole career, like a three dimensional curriculum vitae, from early signs of his talent to his blockbuster movies. Born in the outskirts of Los Angeles, he grew up in a quiet, conservative town where nothing much happened. His vivid imagination helped him find relief through drawing and making homemade films with a Super 8mm camera. A look at his suburban beginnings helps understand his future artistic identity. The bland ‘normality’ of his surroundings led him to reach for the other extreme, which he found expressed in horror and science fiction films. He also loved festivities because it was the only time that the town, and its people, lit up. At the age of 9 he dressed up for Halloween in a skeletal figure costume designed with the help of his mother, that would form the basis for his iconic character Jack Skellington many years later.
Working as an apprentice for Walt Disney was one of his earliest jobs, but the role soon became too constricted for his wild creativity. He began designing and filming short personal projects just to satisfy the need to realise his vision, and the worlds he built kept growing bigger and bigger. It was in 1985 that he made his feature film debut with Pee-wee’s Big Adventure, then in 1988 came Beetlejuice which shot him to stardom. The World of Tim Burton features hundreds of exhibits. The vast majority are drawings, brimming with imagination, but there are also 3D models of his characters, handwritten notes and fun artefacts. One of the highlights are the puppets of the 2005 stop-motion animation Corpse Bride, made by his long time collaborators Mackinnon & Saunders.
A recreation of his studio acts as a reminder of the vast range of his artistic skills: a desk crowded with illustrations, painting materials, film scripts, a camera and figurines depicting imaginary characters, gives a glimpse of the rife level of activity within Burton’s mind. His impulse to create is so strong that he frequently draws on hotel notepads or napkins. So frequently, in fact, that there is a collection of these on display. Farther in the exhibition the focus turns to his famous live action films, with mannequins donning the original costumes from Batman Returns, Edward Scissorhands, Sleepy Hollow and other classics.
Fans cannot afford to miss this comprehensive showcase of Tim Burton’s artistic flair, and every one else will likely be just as impressed and inspired by it. Upon seeing the abundance of his original ideas and creations, one cannot help admire the uncontainable force of his talent. In fact, the exhibition leaves one with the suspicion that over the years Hollywood may have curbed and deviated his creative flow to better cohere with its commercial needs, leaving much more potential stifled and as yet unexplored.
Photo Credit: Mersa Auda.
— Mersa Auda
