Long before he started making even short films, Timothy William Burton wielded pen and paper with the best of them, copying his favourite Universal monsters to begin with and creating his own bizarre beasties from a very early age. It's something that he's continued ever since: his films are conceived in his voluminous sketch books as much as in their scripts (see the April issue of Empire for examples), and his independent characters (as seen in his book The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy) have also taken on a life of their own - and that's not even discussing his brief career as a Disney animator. If you're in New York before April 26, you can see a selection of artwork from throughout his career among the Monets and Warhols of MoMA.