THE ART OF THE BRICK // NATHAN SAWAYA

Yellow, Nathan Sawaya. Photograph via: The Art of the Brick

Red, Nathan Sawaya. Photograph via: The Art of the Brick

Blue, Nathan Sawaya. Photograph via: The Art of the Brick

Tyrannosaurus Rex Skeleton by Nathan Sawaya

Nathan Sawaya is a New York based corporate attorney turned full-time independent LEGO artist. Impressive.

Sawaya's LEGO sculptures take anywhere between a couple of days to a couple of months to create depending on the size and complexity of the form. His sculptural process often begins with a proposed sketch of the form on grid paper and then he will occasionally use Lego Digital Designer software which has virtual bricks programmed with gravitational physics for positioning.  

There's something so relatable and nostalgic about the use of LEGO pieces as a sculptural medium. On average, most of us have built something out of LEGO at some point during our lives. So, to take LEGO and incorporate it into the art world makes one perceive the medium and the art form in an entirely different light. You can go to a museum and admire a sculpture carved from marble but you can't necessarily go home and carve one for yourself. However,  unlike the marble most of us can quite easily get access to some LEGO pieces and create sculptural art of our own. I think it's this nostalgic familiarity of Sawaya's choice of medium that makes the art world seem a lot more 'accessible' and a lot less daunting - something that he should be commended for in my opinion. 

And if that's not quite enough for you to commend him on, how about the 20ft T-Rex skeleton LEGO sculpture he built for Singapore's ArtScience Museum over a summer of 8 to 12 hour days, commanding 80,000 Lego brick pieces? All I'm saying is that I built a small LEGO panda recently measuring in at about four fingers wide and it took me all of an hour. I was quietly chuffed with my efforts after its completion. And did you know that a professor of Mathematics calculated that 6 LEGO pieces can be combined in over 915 million different combinations? I'm even more impressed than I was at the beginning of this post..

Sawaya's art is currently touring museums in a show titles, The Art of the Brick. It's the first exhibition focusing exclusively on LEGO as an art medium. The creations, constructed from countless individual LEGO pieces were built from standard bricks beginning as early as 2002. More information on the tour, dates and location can be found on the Art of the Brick Museum page.