S T Y L E 生活時尚 15 TAIPEI TIMES • WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 2, 2009 Old monsters and lurid fantasies take over MoMA New York’s Museum of Modern Art goes lowbrow with a retrospective on the work of filmmaker Tim Burton BY Linda YablOnsKY BLOOMBERG ust beyond the Monster Mouth — puts no fewer than 700 items on display entrance, a black-lighted, in just a few small rooms. While it feels goblin-festooned carousel turns comprehensive, the spread delivers mainly J hypnotically to dorky horror- minor amusements in the form of sight gags movie music. and puppets. At New York’s Museum of Modern Art, the exceedingly lowbrow Tim OBSESSIVE CARTooNIST Burton, a cramped retrospective of the Among the hundreds of inked illustrations, popular filmmaker’s drawings, robot sketches and pastels are grimacing stick sculptures and animated shorts, figures with exaggerated lips, electrified makes it easy to forget that this is coifs and stitched limbs, as well as horribly the home of Monet, Matisse and deformed monsters aching for love. Picasso, not Disney. Burton, 51, is essentially an obsessive MoMA has even cartoonist and an animator of the very first replaced Rodin’s order, though his drawings and illustrations Balzac in the lobby owe a big debt to Roald Dahl, the source with a 6.4m-tall, blue- of another Burton film, Charlie and the and-white balloon Chocolate Factory. character that looks They also recall Aubrey Beardsley’s fashion like a cross between illustrations and Hillary Knight’s Eloise a giant light bulb and drawings, absent the wholesome attributes. a boy’s wide-eyed Expressionistic, film-related drawings face — at least for and dolls (created by collaborators) as opening week. well as metallic robots created by Burton’s While own hand appear in the show. A nearly guaranteed to life-size model of Edward Scissorhands is create a new here, as well as maquettes for Beetlejuice, generation of young a diorama and video episodes from The art viewers, the World of Stainboy (a series of animations exhibition spins the made in 2000 for the Internet), drawings museum in a whole for unrealized projects, and amateur new direction movies Burton shot with high-school pals — away from in suburban Burbank, California — an sober modernism inspiration for several of his feature films. and closer to funhouse carnivalism. This is either a refreshing change of pace or a bald REINDEER TOPIARY This drawing by Tim Burton from capitulation to commercialism. Or both. All of this adds insight into Burton’s vivid his 1990 film Edward Scissorhands There’s no question that Burton is imagination and gives MoMA a populist Above: Creations by filmmaker Tim Burton are on display at the a wildly imaginative and entertaining profile, but it hardly qualifies as consuming art. is part of the exhibition titled Tim Museum of Modern Art in New York until April 26. PHOTO: AFP Burton at the Museum of Modern filmmaker. From Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure The outstanding works may be a 30-second Art in New York. PHOTO: BLOOMBERG and Beetlejuice to Edward Scissorhands, animated commercial for the show and a Top left: Tim Burton poses with one of his works during a media Batman and Sweeney Todd, his antic humor reindeer topiary (as Scissorhands’s fingers preview for his show at New York’s Museum of Modern Art on and gothic sensibilities have given movie might have fashioned it) in the sculpture “I was struck by how similar the vibe was to Nov. 17. PHOTO: AFP the cemetery.” audiences plenty of reasons to guffaw. garden, which isn’t usually given to satire. His first show in a major museum may As a fine artist, however, he has a way to In the show’s catalog, Burton writes Untitled (Ramone), is part of the Tim Burton exhibition at New go. Still, he is nothing if not prolific. that as a child growing up in the cultural bury Picasso in la-la land, but it does so with York’s Museum of Modern Art. PHOTO: BLOOMBERG The show, which marks the museum’s wasteland of Burbank, he went to horror a liveliness that could prove contagious -— if acquisition of 11 Burton films for its movies, made drawings and embraced the only that weren’t quite so unhealthy for the collection — they are being screened in local cemetery as his playground. Later, cause of art. the museum’s theater throughout the run when he started going to museums, he says, On the Net: www.moma.org Chinese paintings beat estimates EXHIBITIONS Works by Zao Wou-ki (趙無 極), Chu Teh-chun (朱德群) as buyers do battle in Hong Kong and Lin Fengmian (林風眠) are among the 227 lots up for sale at Ravenel’s autumn auction In its sale of Chinese art, Christie’s saw furious bidding for works by of contemporary Asian art. Even if you don’t have an extra couple of established artists as investors sought to convert their currency holdings into assets million NT dollars lying around to spend on a painting by Chinese Zao Wou-ki, 17.4.64 (1964). BY LE-Min Lim 常玉 artist Sanyu ( ) or a sculpture PHOTO COURTESY OF RAVENEL BLOOMBERG by Taiwanese artist Ju Ming (朱 銘), the previews are a great their doors this weekend for An abstract painting of falling snow by opportunity to check out some SuPerArt, a two-day event that Chinese artist Chu Teh-chun (朱德群) rarely seen works of art. Previews offers the public an opportunity fetched a record US$5.9 million in Hong will be held on Friday and to catch a glimpse of artists in Kong, the surprise top lot of an auction that Saturday from 10am to 7pm, with residence. The event kicks off with saw bidders vie for the priciest artworks. the gavel hitting the auction block a guided tour of Grass Mountain Vertige Neigeux, an oil-on-canvas on Sunday beginning at 2:30pm. Artist Village at 11:20am and diptych that took France-based Chu about ■ Fubon Life Building (富邦人壽), Taipei Artist Village at 2pm on a decade to complete, topped estimates B2, 108, Dunhua S Rd Sec 1, Taipei Saturday. Other highlights include and went to an unidentified Asian private City (台北市敦化南路一段108號B2). exhibitions by individual artists, buyer. There was a five-minute tussle On the Net: ravenelart.com artists’ talks, music and workshops. among bidders on the phone and in ■ Preview: Friday and Saturday The multicultural cast of artists the packed hall of about 400 people at from 10am to 7pm. Auction: hails from Poland, Australia, Brazil, Christie’s International evening sale of Sunday from 2:30pm to 8:30pm Mexico, Argentina, Lithuania and 20th-century and contemporary Asian Taiwan. A shuttle bus to Grass works on Sunday night. Including the Contemporary Taiwanese Mountain Artist Village leaves daytime auctions of modern and ink photographer Tseng Miin-Shyong’s Taipei Artist Village at 10:30am on Chinese paintings, the company tallied (曾敏雄) Face’s Talk (台灣頭) both days. The bus will return at US$79 million yesterday. showcases 116 photographic 1:30pm. For reservations call Ms “Works by established Chinese artists portraits of Taiwan’s literary figures, Li at (02) 2862-2404 or (02) 3393- such as Chu and Zao Wou-ki (趙無極) are artists, musicians, religious leaders, 7377 X208. the most sought-after; they are driving performing artists and politicians ■ Taipei Artist Village (台北藝術 prices,” Anthony Lin, a Hong Kong-based as well as a new generation of 村), 7 Beiping E Rd, Taipei City (台 art consultant, said in an interview after the innovators. Along with the portraits, 北市北平東路7號); Grass Mountain sale, at the harbor-front convention center. four photographic slideshows Artist Village (草山國際藝術村), 92 Chinese buyers drove prices higher. — One Day With Ko Si-chi (柯錫杰的 Hudi Rd, Taipei City (台北市湖底路 Inflation concerns in China and a sagging 一天), One Day With Hsieh Li-fa (謝 92號). On the Net: US dollar are driving the Chinese to 里法的一天), 50 Years of Chao-tang www.artistvillage.org convert currencies into assets such as (照堂五十) and 50 Years of Ju Ming ■ Taipei Artist Village’s open art. They are choosing pieces by living (朱銘五十) — will offer revealing house is Saturday and Sunday masters such as Chu and deceased artists Above: Untitled (Hospital Series) by Chinese artist Zeng Fanzhi was sold for HK$19 million (US$2.5 million) and intimate visual profiles of from 2pm to 6pm. Grass Mountain Fu Baoshi (傅抱石) and Xu Beihong (徐 after fierce competition involving Wang Wei, wife of millionaire Chinese stock-investor Liu Yiqian, and one well-known artists. The exhibit also Artist Village’s open house is 悲鴻) because they are more likely to other auction-room bidder at Christie’s International Hong Kong auction on Sunday. PHOTO: BLOOMBERG features an activity — Everyone Saturday and Sunday from 11am retain value than contemporary works by Right: Landscape inspired by Dufu Poetic Sentiment by Chinese artist Fu Baoshi was hammered off for HK$60 Is a Taiwan Head (人人都是台灣 to 4pm Chinese artists in their 30s and 40s. million (US$7.7 million) at Christie’s Hong Kong auction on Sunday, a price market experts said was around 頭) — where Tseng will personally A 1944 scroll of ink-and-color on paper 愛 four times higher than its 2006 price. PHOTO: REUTERS photograph 20 visitors every I Love NY (I NY) is a solo by Fu (1904-1965) called Landscape Tuesday until the end of the year. exhibit of laser images by Inspired by Dufu’s Poetic Sentiments ■ Taipei Fine Arts Museum (台 Taiwanese artist Chen Ching-yao fetched an artist record of US$7.7 million “The huge price gap between these two after fierce competition involving Wang 北市立美術館), 181, Zhongshan (陳擎耀).