She is a recipient of a MacArthur Foundation Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, two Tony Awards, and two Obie Awards. She currently has a book out about her 25-year career titled “Playing with Fire.” She is Julie Taymor, whose work through the years, and most recently, in “The Lion King,” has had audiences worldwide transfixed and begging for more. “Julie Taymor: Playing with Fire” opened to the public on Saturday at the Wexner Center, and takes a close look at Taymor’s career, which encompasses theater, opera, film and television. Key productions of her career are brought to life as costumes, masks, puppets, and other features of her work occupy all four galleries of the Wexner Center. To illustrate the enormity of Taymor’s creative vision, and to recreate the atmosphere of the original shows, the exhibit also features theatrical lighting, music, preparatory drawings, video clips, scale models, set designs, paintings, and other materials related to the processes of producing and performing her work. The Wexner Center had the help of several designers and artists from the original productions in setting up the displays. The exhibition is part of a string of events planned by the Wexner Center to celebrate its 10th anniversary season.”We wanted a project that was a landmark to the center’s history,” said Charles Helm, director of the performing arts for the Wexner Center. “In terms of people in the performing arts, she has done an incredible job. Julie is really one of the most important artists of our time. Her career spans so many areas, and those areas reflect on the multidisciplinary interests of the center. She doesn’t just tell the actor or actress where to enter and exit, she sculpts and designs and choreographs. She’s the perfect artist for us to focus on.”Taymor’s 1997 interpretation of Disney’s “The Lion King” on Broadway opened to rave reviews from some of the country’s toughest theater critics and earned her two Tony Awards. One for best costume design and another for best director of a musical, which made her the first female to receive that honor. Taymor’s involvement in the highly commercial production was a distinct change from her previous endeavors.”‘The Lion King’ was a challenge to me,” Taymor explained to the capacity crowd during a presentation Friday at the Mershon Auditorium. “The kind I like,” she quickly added with a smile. Disney was very open to her ideas she said, and allowed her to incorporate much of her own style into the production. It was the task of transforming the actors into their animal characters that intrigued her, she said, so she applied what she called “the double event,” a rather unique way of using masks. By placing the mask on top of the head, rather than over the face, the actors were able to perform without having a cumbersome object covering their faces, hiding their expressions and voices. These totem-like masks also helped to give the characters a larger-than-life presence, she said.Taymor cites her years in Indonesia as her inspirations. “Being in a culture where theater is not seen as a luxury, but rather a major part of everyday life, we are reminded of the true reason theater was created,” Taymor said. “You do it because you love the art of creating.”The exhibit of Taymor’s work and related events will be at the Wexner Center through Jan. 2, 2000. For more information, call 292-3535.