Vanessa Harryhausen and Connor Heaney with some of the artwork and plans made by her father, Ray Harryhausen. As collection manager for the Ray and Diana Harryhausen Foundation, Heaney oversees the many models, drawings and paintings that Ray created. (The National Galleries of Scotland/submitted)
Medusa is coming to town.
Many will know of her well-earned reputation for turning those who gaze at her into stone. With her madness, cracked skin and head covered in live snakes, it’s not a surprise that such a fate would befall anyone who looked into her eyes.
But those who come to visit her when she takes up temporary residence at the Mini Time Machine Museum of Miniatures won’t suffer such a fate. A hydra accompanies her, but it will not be protecting a golden fleece. Nor will a phalanx of skeletons brandishing swords rise up from the earth, ready for a fight.
Beginning Tuesday, Sept. 30, the museum opens its doors to “Ray Harryhausen: Miniature Models of the Silver Screen,” an exhibit of about 100 of the models and figures created by the stop-motion animator and special effects artist whose works contributed to many nightmares and influenced generations of moviemakers. His models “starred” in such films as “The Valley of Gwangi” (1969), “One Million Years B.C.” (1966) “Jason and the Argonauts” (1963) and, of course, “Clash of the Titans” (1981).
The museum has been in talks with the Ray and Diana Harryhausen Foundation to bring the exhibit to Tucson since before the COVID outbreak. Vanessa Harryhausen, a trustee of the foundation and daughter of the late artist (he died in 2013) and foundation collection manager Connor Heaney traveled with the collection.
Harryhausen herself grew up with the figures and considers them her friends. When asked which one she likes best, she said, “I don’t like to get them jealous because I have quite a few,” beginning with the griffin from “The Golden Voyage of Sinbad” and the dinosaur Gwangi from “The Valley of Gwangi.”
The models really were her playthings.
“I took Gwangi to Harrod’s in my baby buggy,” she said. “These ladies asked to see my dollies. They pulled back the cover to this dinosaur. They gave my mother such a hard time because this poor little girl was carrying this old creature.”
Before today’s powerful computers and animation software, making stop-motion animation was no small task. Besides the models — which themselves are an intricate conglomeration of metal armature, cast latex or rubber skin, clothing and paint — the work of making them move on film is a testament to tenacity. Take, for example, a sword fighting scene from “Jason and the Argonauts.”
“If you think about that famous skeleton sequence, that was such a complicated scene,” Heaney said. “It’s seven different skeletons with moving arms, legs, weapons and also having that live action footage. Ray would spend an entire day and come away with half a second of footage.”
That one three-minute sequence all by itself took more than four months to make.
There were other issues to consider with film which young people today might not realize.
Although she said she loves all her dad’s creations, the Medusa model is one Vanessa Harryhausen does not like. (The Ray and Diana Harryhausen Foundation/submitted)
“With film (Ray) was doing all of it in his head,” Emily Wolverton, museum curator, said. “There was extraordinary pressure, the pressure that if he got it wrong, if he got the lighting wrong one day from the next, it would affect everything. Keeping it all in his head and not having the ability to go back and check his work and redo it, that is so hard to explain to kids, the magic and tediousness of film versus a digital format.”
Harryhausen watched her dad work and from him learned what can go awry on film.
“Dad used to say that he didn’t always see something until you saw it in the rushes and then maybe he’d have to just go and adjust something,” she said.
There were other problems with film that had to be overcome.
“Ray made the first color stop-motion film in ‘The 7th Voyage of Sinbad,’” Heaney said. “He was concerned about it because technicolor at the time was an analog thing. He was worried that because he had to combine his animation with the live action footage, the order might change, the colors might warp overnight. It was a very organic thing.
“Ray’s father created the metal armatures (skeletons) for the figures. At that time another machinist took over. To create the rest of the model, Ray and sometimes his daughter taped the figure’s joints with a latex binding so it could still bend properly, but generally, a plaster mold was created, the armature was put inside and then latex rubber would be poured down. It would be baked as well. We still have the oven Ray used.”
Harryhausen said her father cared about the next generation of artists, mentoring them to the point of having the family’s number listed in the phone book. It was important to him that they remember what inspired them.
“He always said, ‘Never let the child go out of you because then you’ve lost your imagination,’” Harryhausen said.
See many of the models on exhibit in “Ray Harryhausen: Miniature Models of the Silver Screen” in action at a screening of “Jason and the Argonauts,” set for 2 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 4 at the Loft Cinema, 3233 E. Speedway Boulevard. For information, visit loftcinema.org/film/jason-and-the-argonauts.
Teachers who would like to bring their students to see “Ray Harryhausen: Miniature Models of the Silver Screen” at the Mini Time Machine Museum of Miniatures but may not be able to locate the funding for admission and transportation should contact the museum. The Sizing Up My World grant may be able to help. For information, visit theminitimemachine.org/school-tours.
“Ray Harryhausen: Miniature Models of the Silver Screen”
WHEN: Sept. 30 through May 3
HOURS: 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday
WHERE:The Mini Time Machine Museum of Miniatures, 4455 E. Camp Lowell Drive
COST: $9-15; free for children 3 and younger
INFO: theminitimemachine.org