With his Robert Smith hair, dark sunglasses to take the edge off the insomniac circles under his eyes, and permanent mortuary-attendant pallor and 5 o'clock shadow, film director Tim Burton's look is as memorable as his films. The perfect definition of auteur, all of his films—from Pee-wee's Big Adventure to the upcoming Big Eyes—are entirely distinguishable as his: There's the mildly damaged outsider (even Roald Dahl's Willy Wonka comes off as an autistic savant); an eye for the off-kilter, kitschy details of the “real” world; an obsession with chiaroscuro cinematography; and a devotion to things campy/macabre.
His style is so iconic, in fact, that even the films he produced—The Nightmare Before Christmas and James and the Giant Peach, both actually directed by Henry Selick—are claimed as his. Google “Tim Burton fan art,” and there are pages of impressive work posted online, so it seems intuitive on the part of Ryan Batcheller and Sam Carter, the duo behind POPzilla, that an entire exhibition of work from local artists focused on the director's films, actors and Burton himself would be a slam-dunk. And it is.
As I walked in the door to preview “The Burton Show” before the crowds arrived at the tiny Rothick Art Haus, people were scurrying about, hanging last-minute arrivals, erecting the sales booth, and clearing the floor of detritus before someone tripped; despite the frenzy, I felt completely at home in the Burton cosmos POPzilla created.
Tracie Cotta walks away with the show with four brilliant mixed-media dioramas: A red bow tie, white dress shirt and gray suit enclosed in glass in I Know You Are But What Am I?; Catwoman stretching in her menstrual-red apartment, the blue-black granite of the outside building appropriately sepulchral; I'm Not Finished, with Edward's scissor blades surrounded by pieces of clockwork and a tiny banner; and, most affecting, a disembodied hand catching snowflakes in the sublime Sometimes You Can Still Catch Me Dancing In It.
A close runner-up is co-founder Carter's digital silhouettes of Burton heroes on a white background, each containing an Easter egg image from the film (e.g., a picture of the Alamo in Pee-wee's profile); his ink-on-paper drawing Pee Wee Scissorhands features clipped topiary dinosaurs, and the comic Betelgeuse merry-go-round includes various Burton characters along for the ride. Genevieve Tsai's affectionate pet-themed foursome of ink and watercolor on paper are perfection, including Betelgeuse on a leash, hiking a leg up at a sand worm; and there's Dan Almanzar's cartoon likenesses of Burton's former fiancée, actress Lisa Marie (in her sunglass-wearing Vampira guise and as the blond-beehived Martian Girl in Mars Attacks!), as well as Jeff Chang's sexier version of the bisected magician's assistant in the waiting room of Beetlejuice.
A fondness for Disney informs Brandon Starr's 3D, lenticular print Captain Jack, with Skellington drinking wine as a cast member of the Pirates of the Caribbean ride, an eye-patched Sally in the painting over his shoulder; Janna Bock's delicious Wonderland, done in the style of vintage Disneyland posters; Ashleymarie Lively's acrylic Haunted Mansion-esque, red-dressed Lydia sitting on a gravestone, titled Stretching Portrait: Bride on a Grave; and Melissa Fairweather's Lydia on a tightrope in Red Red Bride. I enjoyed Batcheller's delightfully nightmarish digital canvas Large Marge Sent Me; Dave Pryor's trio of pink, gray and puke-green acrylic Batman, Catwoman and Penguin paintings (with the finest titles in the entire history of the art form that I won't ruin here); as well as the swirling beauty of Emily, the mold on Betelgeuse's cheeks, and ice flying into the air as Edward sculpts in Tom Hodges' series of pencil, marker and acrylic drawings on toned gray paper.
So, in the sue-happy corporate world of copyright infringement, are curators Batcheller and Carter standing on the shoulders of giants, hustling a buck off the work of someone more famous than they are? Or are they just encouraging modern-day Manets and Rembrandts, who riffed on predecessors they admired, such as Titian? While few of the artists on display hit those artistic heights, after an enlightening, half-hour discussion with the two men, I'm siding with their excited, unofficial tribute to Burton and assigning their enthusiasm not to unfettered capitalism—a joke on this level anyway—but to a healthy dose of respect, mixed with fanboy devotion.
Not that I don't have more than a few complaints: The overabundance of Jack and Sally from Nightmare borders on the uninspired, the less obviously Burton-esque films such as Big Fish or Planet of the Apes get short shrift, and I wished there had been less direct representation and more experimentation—along the lines of Ray Brown's memorable mash-up sculptures of Jack, Pee-wee and Batman or Kasey Tararuj's custom-made mini munnys—but it's important to consider that fan art means the artist involved is invested in the work (and the artist) being honored. Because Burton's fanboy love for Frankenstein, Famous Monsters of Filmland magazine and actor Vincent Price informed Frankenweenie, Edward Scissorhands and any number of other films, I can't imagine he wouldn't be flattered by all these fine artists showing the love.
Dave Barton has written for the OC Weekly for over twenty years, the last eight as their lead art critic. He has interviewed artists from punk rock photographer Edward Colver to monologist Mike Daisey, playwright Joe Penhall to culture jammer Ron English.