Why We Seek Out the Strange: Tim Burton’s World
A Day Out of the Studio for Inspiration
There ’s something magical about stepping into a room filled with Tim Burton’s creations. You instantly feel like you’ve crossed into that unmistakable Burton universe, where the strange is beautiful, the crooked is charming, and nothing is ever quite what you expect it to be.
The exhibition opened with walls covered in Burton’s sketches – decades of ideas, doodles, characters, and shapes that feel like the pages of his imagination laid bare. People often describe his work as twisted or dark, but looking at those drawings up close, it strikes you just how playful and curious his mind really is. It’s not darkness for darkness’ sake; it’s wonder. It’s the refusal to accept that things must look or feel a certain way. Burton’s world is built from a perspective that sees oddness as charm, shadows as texture, and imperfection as character.
Visiting an exhibition of his movie props this year reminded me just how much depth and craft sits behind the films we all know so well.
Walking through the space, you move from loose sketches to full storyboards, to recreated sets, and then (my personal favourite), the actual stop-motion models used for The Nightmare Before Christmas and Corpse Bride. I always imagined these puppets as relatively small and delicate, but seeing them in real life, they’re much bigger than expected. And the detail, wow! Every millimetre, every wrinkle, every curve of a jaw has been crafted with such precision that the camera can press in close from any angle and still find a shot that feels complete and alive. But, these are far from perfect, and that makes them perfection. The slight off nature to the models make them so real and drag you into the world on screen. It’s no wonder those films feel so tactile; the world was literally built to be seen.
For us at Blast & Aftermath, exhibitions like this are more than a fun day out – they’re essential. Our work often lives on screens, sure, but our inspiration can’t. Stepping away from the computer and into the physical world does something nothing digital ever can. It reminds us that creativity is human first, software second. Whether it’s the work of an iconic filmmaker, the identity of an unexpected brand, or simply the shapes and colours of everyday life, seeing things in the real world reconnects us with curiosity.
And that’s exactly what Burton’s exhibition gave me: a boost of wonder, a reminder to keep looking sideways at things, and proof that the world, when viewed through a slightly skewed lens, becomes infinitely more interesting.
B&A CD, Matt
There’s something magical about stepping into a room filled with Tim Burton’s creations. You instantly feel like you’ve crossed into that unmistakable Burton universe, where the strange is beautiful, the crooked is charming, and nothing is ever quite what you expect it to be.
The exhibition opened with walls covered in Burton’s sketches – decades of ideas, doodles, characters, and shapes that feel like the pages of his imagination laid bare. People often describe his work as twisted or dark, but looking at those drawings up close, it strikes you just how playful and curious his mind really is. It’s not darkness for darkness’ sake; it’s wonder. It’s the refusal to accept that things must look or feel a certain way. Burton’s world is built from a perspective that sees oddness as charm, shadows as texture, and imperfection as character.
Visiting an exhibition of his movie props this year reminded me just how much depth and craft sits behind the films we all know so well.
Walking through the space, you move from loose sketches to full storyboards, to recreated sets, and then (my personal favourite), the actual stop-motion models used for The Nightmare Before Christmas and Corpse Bride. I always imagined these puppets as relatively small and delicate, but seeing them in real life, they’re much bigger than expected. And the detail, wow! Every millimetre, every wrinkle, every curve of a jaw has been crafted with such precision that the camera can press in close from any angle and still find a shot that feels complete and alive. But, these are far from perfect, and that makes them perfection. The slight off nature to the models make them so real and drag you into the world on screen. It’s no wonder those films feel so tactile; the world was literally built to be seen.
For us at Blast & Aftermath, exhibitions like this are more than a fun day out – they’re essential. Our work often lives on screens, sure, but our inspiration can’t. Stepping away from the computer and into the physical world does something nothing digital ever can. It reminds us that creativity is human first, software second. Whether it’s the work of an iconic filmmaker, the identity of an unexpected brand, or simply the shapes and colours of everyday life, seeing things in the real world reconnects us with curiosity.
And that’s exactly what Burton’s exhibition gave me: a boost of wonder, a reminder to keep looking sideways at things, and proof that the world, when viewed through a slightly skewed lens, becomes infinitely more interesting.
B&A CD, Matt