The anti-nightmare before Pho Hung

Dear Tim Burton, regarding your current Toronto exhibit brought over from MOMA, you are amazing.

When Mr. Burton drew the third highest audience to MOMA to view his exhibit ever, (up there with Picasso), you had to know that we are not just talking about a good artist- we are chronicling and examining a living gift and imaginative treasure to the world of art, cinema, fashion, architecture and oh-so much more.

Now I begin this by saying that I am a lifetime Tim Burton fan. Everything he does, I will watch and usually love. I grew up watching Beetlejuice almost every single day (and yes, I am sure that qualifies me as having some kind of OCD, I accept it, can we move on now?). I forever covet the roles played by the amazing Winona Ryder and Helena Bonham Carter as what I would imagine myself doing if I was a celebrity movie star and when Harpers Bazaar published a full fashion editorial spread back in 2009, I almost lost my mind- did he just go ahead and create images straight out of my imagination? Possible.

Anyways, I went to this exhibit and walked around for hours in awe. I read every tiny piece of information and savored every inch of his various works. I touched things that said "do not touch" and I feel no regret. The exhibit itself is over 700 works from Tim Burton over his extensive and magnificent career. Located at Toronto's new-ish TIFF lighbox it is truly a revelation and worth the money they charge to admit you.

Another very cool thing about this exhibit is the TIFF lightbox is also spending the duration of the exhibit, which runs until April 17th, screening Tim Burton movies and you can even catch a double feature that shows a movie that Tim Burton found inspiration from or liked coupled with the movie that he drew from the first to make. I was delighted and slightly smug to see my all time favorite movie, The Ghost and Ms. Muir coupled with Big Fish. We like the same movies Tim and I- no big deal.
He was a huge part of my inspiration to begin my sketchbook drawings (see my other post) and to just take some more time to really create.

Yet another amazing thing associated with this exhibit is the Exquisite Corpse. In the modernist movement, Andre Breton, often named the father of modernism would play a game with his peers which basically entailed them doing crazy psychedelic drugs and writing a story where each persona would contribute a line and pass the story around. In the end it would be some convoluted and totally nonsensical story with no coherence or cohesion. The name came from the first sentence of the first one of these games ever played, the exquisite corpse. The name has always really tickled me and so again, imagine my delight to see that as a link on Tim Burton's exhibit page there is a living exquisite corpse where his fans and followers can tweet sentences in about the character Stain Boy. Each day several sentences are chosen and these all combined will eventually become the most exquisite corpse.

My only criticism is that to me, I was dying to get inside his brain, like to REALLY REALLY get to know the genius behind the works but I found that there was nowhere to go above and beyond the verbiage attached to each piece. There were the double features with the inspiring and inspired movies together but I just wanted this kind of coupling for everything. I would have loved to understand how and when he first thought up Corpse Bride or Stain Boy- who are these creations and what they might mean to him at the time he created them then and now. In leaving the exhibit I felt a longing for more which is both indicative of a successful performance (always leave your audience wanting more) and of one that had so much more room to grow.

So dear reader, I beg you to please go visit a very cool spac in the city and a very cool exhibit. Especially if you have little knowledge about Time Burton you will be floored at how much he has done that you will know. Plus, ladies, the ORIGINAL Edward Scissorhand suit is there to see- Johnny Depp wore it, maybe naked underneath- just saying.

Point: It's just so awesome when you have the privilege of seeing true talent. We have so much of it to celebrate around us and this exhibit is just one of many that you can see and support. Really worth checking out.