Tim Burton: A retrospective

Artist, illustrator, photographer, writer and director Tim Burton appears at New York's Museum of Modern Art on November 17 to help launch his career retrospective featuring drawings, paintings, puppets and films.

The show of Burton's works, which runs at MoMA until April 26, shows artwork generated during the conception and production of the director's films, pieces from unrealized projects, student art, his early non-professional films and work for non-film endeavors.

Joining Burton at the museum was his girlfriend, actress Helena Bonham Carter, second from left, frequent collaborator Johnny Depp, left, and actor Danny DeVito, right.

These figures, including Stain Boy, center background, and Robot Boy, right, are part of Tim Burton exhibit's at the Museum of Modern Art.

This sculpture, which looks like many of the dark, menacing characters in Burton's films, is one of the more than 700 works of art on display.

Tim Burton on set with actor Johnny Depp, who frequently works with Burton, during the filiming of "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street" in 2007. The movie is about a man unjustly sent to prison by a lecherous judge who vows revenge.

Johnny Depp starred as the title character in Burton's "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street." The director often has taken classic tales and put his own dark spin on them.

Bonham Carter and Burton discuss a scene on the set of "Sweeney Todd." The British actress has been in several Burton films, starting with "Planet of the Apes." They have been a couple since working on the 2001 film and now have two children together.

It was while watching Burton's "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" (2005) that MoMA assistant curator Ron Magliozzi dreamed up the exhibit.

Tim Burton on the set of the movie "Corpse Bride," which he co-directed in 2005.

"Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride," an animated movie is set in a 19th-century European village, tells the story of young Victor, who is whisked away to the underworld and wed to a mysterious Corpse Bride, while his real bride, Victoria, waits bereft in the land of the living.

Tim Burton directed the remake of "Planet of the Apes" (2001), which starred, from left, Helena Bonham Carter, Mark Wahlberg and Paul Giamatti.

Johnny Depp stars as the title character in "Edward Scissorhands" (1990). Burton got the idea for the film from a drawing he did as a teenager. This film is reportedly the director's favorite of his own work. It was also Depp's first with Burton; he has since starred in several Burton movies.

Deep Roy, left, and Danny DeVito, center-right, appear in Burton's "Big Fish," a 2003 movie about a boy, Edward Bloom, who realizes that in order for him to grow he must leave home and explore the world. And thus, an improbable and mythic journey begins.

Johnny Depp also starred as Ichabod Crane in Burton's 1999 take on "Sleepy Hollow." In the movie, Crane is a discredited professor who is exiled to Sleepy Hollow because of his outrageous theories.

In another Burton movie, Johnny Depp plays the title role in the 1994 film "Ed Wood," which tells the story of low-budget Hollywood director Edward D. Wood, Jr., whose notoriously "bad" cult films include "Glen or Glenda?" and "Plan 9 from Outer Space."

This shows an image from "Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas" storyboard from 1993.

This movie still from "Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas" (1993) shows Sally and Jack. The movie is about Jack Skellington, aka the Pumpkin King, who is bored with his job and feels that life in Halloweenland lacks meaning. He stumbles upon Christmastown and promptly decides to make the Yuletide his own.

Jack Nicholson played The Joker in Burton's 1990 film "Batman."

Michael Keaton stars in "Beetlejuice," directed by Tim Burton in 1988. The movie is about a dead couple who attempt to scare a modern family out of their house with the help of a "bio-exorcist."

This is Burton's watercolor and pastel drawing of a Martian that looks very much like those that appear in his 1995 film "Mars Attacks!"

This 1990 sketch of the character Edward Scissorhands is one of the many artworks on display.

The Martian Girl and Jack Nicholson in the 1996 movie, "Mars Attacks!" The film, directed by Burton, is about aliens who invade earth and pretend to be peaceful.

Burton made his directorial debut in 1985's "Pee-wee's Big Adventure," starring Paul Reubens. If you look closely at the film, you'll see the director in a cameo just before Pee-wee enters the fortune teller's studio.

This sketch comes from Burton's 1997 children's poetry book "The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy and Other Stories." Some of the characters in this book would later appear in a Flash series called "The World of Stain Boy."

Another sketch from 1982–1984 that would inspire stories for Burton's children's book, "The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy and Other Stories."

This 1982 sketch would inspire "Frankenweenie," a live-action film Burton released in 1984.

"The World of Stainboy," written and directed by Burton, was released in 2000. He drew this image with pen and ink, watercolor wash and colored pencil.

Burton's 1997 painting “Blue Girl with Wine” looks like a Picasso portrait of Sally from “Nightmare Before Christmas." The painting is in the third part of the MoMA exhibit, where Burton's film work takes center stage.

"The Green Man" (1996-1998) was created with oil and acrylic paint.

This image shows another Burton image "Untitled (Blue Girl with Skull)" (1992–1999).

This Burton piece, produced in 1982, was done using pen and ink, marker, and watercolor wash on paper.

This Burton untitled piece, included in his Romeo and Juliet collection (1981–1984) was made with pen and ink, marker, and colored pencil on paper.

This piece, created with pen and ink, marker, and watercolor wash on paper, was produced in 1982.

Burton drew this image in 1983 while working at Disney. None of his work ended up making it into the studio's first PG-rated animated feature "The Black Cauldron."

The artist-director shows his musical taste in this drawing called "Untitled (Ramone)."

This pen-and-ink watercolor portrait called Untitled (Picasso Woman is among the many works on display at MoMa.

Burton created this pen-and-ink collage, called Untitled (Trick or Treat), in 1980.