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Associated Press

The imagination of Tim Burton has produced ghosts and ghouls, Martians, monsters and misfits – all of which are on display at an exhibition opening in London in time for Halloween.
But what really scares him is artificial intelligence.
Burton says that seeing a website that had used AI to blend his drawings with Disney characters “really disturbed” him.
“It wasn’t an intellectual thought – it was just an internal, visceral feeling,” Burton said during a preview of “The World of Tim Burton” exhibition at London’s Design Museum. “I looked at those things and I thought, ‘Some of these are pretty good.’ […] (But) it gave me a weird sort of scary feeling inside.”


Burton says he thinks AI is unstoppable, because “once you can do it, people will do it.”
The exhibition reveals Burton to be an analogue artist, who started off as a child in the 1960s experimenting with paints and coloured pencils in his suburban Californian home.
“I wasn’t, early on, a very verbal person,” Burton says. “Drawing was a way of expressing myself.”
Decades later, after films including Edward Scissorhands, Batman, The Nightmare Before Christmas and Beetlejuice, his ideas still begin with drawing.
The exhibition features 600 items from movie studio collections and Burton’s personal archive, and traces those ideas as they advance from sketches through collaboration with set, production and costume designers on the way to the big screen.
It’s like seeing your dirty laundry put on the walls. It’s quite amazing. It’s a bit overwhelming
Tim Burton, on the exhibition
London is the exhibition’s final stop on a decade-long tour of 14 cities in 11 countries. It has been reconfigured and expanded with 90 new objects for its run in the British capital, where Burton has lived for a quarter century.
The show includes early drawings and oddities, including a competition-winning “crush litter” sign a teenage Burton designed for refuse collection trucks in Burbank, California.
There is also a re-creation of Burton’s studio, down to the trays of paints and The Curse of Frankenstein mug full of pencils.


Alongside hundreds of drawings there are props, puppets, set designs and iconic costumes, including Johnny Depp’s Edward Scissorhands talons and the black latex Catwoman costume worn by Michelle Pfeiffer in Batman Returns.
“We had very generous access to Tim’s archive in London, stuffed full of thousands of drawings, storyboards from stop-motion films, sketches, character notes, poems,” says Maria McLintock, the exhibition’s curator.
“And how to synthesise such a wide-ranging and meandering career within one exhibition was a fun challenge – but definitely a challenge,” she adds.
Seeing it has not been a wholly fun experience for Burton, who said he is unable to look too closely at the items on display.
“It’s like seeing your dirty laundry put on the walls,” he says. “It’s quite amazing. It’s a bit overwhelming.”


Burton, whose long-awaited horror-comedy sequel Beetlejuice Beetlejuice opened at the Venice Film Festival in August, is currently filming the second series of Netflix’ Addams Family-themed series Wednesday.
These days he is a major Hollywood director whose American gothic style has spawned an adjective – “Burtoneqsue”. But he still feels like an outsider.
“Once you feel that way, it never leaves you,” he says.
“Each film I did was a struggle,” he adds, noting that early films like Pee-wee’s Big Adventure (1985) and Beetlejuice (1988) received some negative reviews. “It seems like it was a pleasant, fine, easy journey, but each one leaves its emotional scars.”


McLintock says Burton “is a deeply emotional filmmaker”.
“I think that’s what drew me to his films as a child,” she says. “He really celebrates the misunderstood outcast, the benevolent monster. So it’s been quite a weird but fun experience spending so much time in his brain and his creative process.
“His films are often called dark,” she adds. “I don’t agree with that. And if they are dark, there’s a very much a kind of hope in the darkness. You always want to hang out in the darkness in his films.”
“The World of Tim Burton” opens on October 25 and runs until April 21, 2025.


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Tim Burton on AI fears and ‘emotional scars’ as London exhibition of his film art opens

An item from Tim Burton’s Nightmare before Christmas on show in London. Photo: EPA-EFE

Filmmaker Tim Burton at a preview of The World of Tim Burton exhibition at London’s Design Museum, featuring 600 creations from the filmmaker’s movies, from Beetlejuice to Batman to The Nightmare Before Christmas. Photo: AFP

The World of Tim Burton curator Maria McLintock looks at artworks along a corridor of the London exhibition. Photo: AFP

Work from Burton’s Nightmare before Christmas on display at the exhibition. Photo: EPA-EFE

 A re-creation of Burton’s working space as part of the exhibition. Photo: EPA-EFE

Work from Burton’s film Corpse Bride at the exhibition. Photo: EPA-EFE

The latex Catwoman costume Michelle Pfeiffer wore in Batman Returns, on display at the exhibition. Photo: AFP

“Burtonesque” creations abound at the London exhibition. Photo: AP

Objects from Burton’s Mars Attacks! at the exhibition. Photo: EPA-EFE

An object from Burton’s Beetlejuice on display at the exhibition. Photo: EPA-EFE

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In time for Halloween, The World of Tim Burton features 600 items from Beetlejuice to Batman – which the director finds ‘a bit overwhelming’


In time for Halloween, The World of Tim Burton features 600 items from Beetlejuice to Batman – which the director finds ‘a bit overwhelming’.


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Tim Burton on AI fears and ‘emotional scars’ as London exhibition of his film art opens

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}In time for Halloween, The World of Tim Burton features 600 items from Beetlejuice to Batman – which the director finds ‘a bit overwhelming’

In time for Halloween, The World of Tim Burton features 600 items from Beetlejuice to Batman – which the director finds ‘a bit overwhelming’