...is the name of the Guillermo del Toro exhibit at LACMA right now. OF COURSE I took Tuesday off manuscripts and research and went to see it with Nous.
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| the faun from Pan's Labyrinth |
del Toro allegedly calls his home in Los Angeles the Bleak House, not because the décor is bleak (I suppose it is, if you're easily disturbed), but because it's full of unexpected twists and rooms. You turn a corner, you think you know where you're going, and --nope. Look. Another cranny, with and things in it. Beautiful things. Fantastic things. OMGWTF things.
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| another creepy dude from Pan's Labyrinth |
The exhibit contains pieces from his personal collection, and it chronicles and illustrates (literally) his creative process. There are notebooks (his notebooks! so amazing), concept art that he's drawn, concept art that other people have drawn, original art from Mike Mignola and Will Eisner, old books, Giger paintings, Moebius paintings... and the seller for me, the life-sized models of the monsters from his films.
Imagine having THEM in your house.
But there were also just beautiful things. Strange things. My camera phone (and the photographer wielding it) cannot do justice to the play of light and shadow in these paintings.
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And then the concept art from Sleeping Beauty. Ah, Maleficent. I always did like you. (It's the dragon. I wanted to be Smaug, see, so Maleficent was just about perfect in my estimation. And clearly maligned. Stupid prince, anyway.)
