More than child’s play

“The Art of the Brick” by Nathan Sawaya, Feb. 5-May 2, Everhart Museum (1901 Mulberry St., Scranton) Info: brickartist.com, everhart-museum.org, 570.346.7186.

by Nikki M. Mascali
Weekender Editor

Think back to your favorite childhood toy. Remember how you could while away hours upon hours playing with your Barbie doll, G.I. Joe or Erector Set? Now imagine being able to play with that toy all day as a grown up — and have it be your job.

Nathan Sawaya does just that. Since the early 2000s, the New York City-based artist has been using LEGO bricks to build sculptures. Beginning Friday, Feb. 5 and continuing through May 2, the Everhart Museum in Scranton will host Sawaya’s LEGO work in an exhibit entitled “The Art of the Brick.”

The exhibit began touring in 2007, and the Everhart pieces are one of three separate exhibits touring North America. Each display contains about 30 of Sawaya’s sculptures, which may include human forms, a giant pencil, a dinosaur skeleton, funky abstract shapes and everything in between made out of out of thousands of those tiny, brightly colored bricks.

“The number of bricks used in a sculpture depends on the size of the sculpture,” Sawaya, 36, told the Weekender. “I estimate that a life-size human form uses around 25,000-30,000 bricks. I don’t know for sure, because it would be a little monotonous to keep count while I am working.”

Sawaya chose LEGO as his medium because he enjoys seeing viewers’ reactions to artwork created out of something so familiar.

“I want to elevate this simple plaything to a place it has never been before,” Sawaya said. “I also appreciate the cleanliness of the medium. The right angles. The distinct lines. As so often in life, it is a matter of perspective. Up close, the shape of the brick is distinctive. But from a distance, those right angles and distinct lines change to curves.”

Weekender: Were LEGO your favorite toy as a kid?

Nathan Sawaya: I was an “art kid” growing up. I drew, I painted, I even sculpted — if Play-Doh counts. I also discovered I loved construction toys. It was Christmas 1978 when I received my first box of LEGO bricks from my grandparents. I remember ripping into the package and building a LEGO house right then, oblivious to the rest of Christmas morning. It seems like I have been creating with LEGO ever since that day.

Of course, these days my LEGO creations are a little bigger than a toy house.

Weekender: How many bricks would you estimate are in your studio at any given time?

Sawaya: My art studio in New York City has about 1.5 million bricks in it at any given time. All of the bricks are sorted by color and shape into rows and rows of clear bins. With the rows of color, walking into my studio is like walking into a rainbow.

Weekender: What is the best thing — and the worst — about building with LEGO?

Sawaya: The best thing is seeing people’s reactions to my work. When people see my LEGO sculptures, they can relate because they have played with LEGO bricks at some point. They can connect to this toy and are amazed what can be done with it.

The worst part about using LEGO is all of the mean e-mails I get from the Lincoln Logs fan groups.

Weekender: How long does it take you to do each piece?

Sawaya: The amount of time it takes to finish a sculpture depends on the size and complexity. It can take weeks to complete a human form. But for something even larger, like the “Dinosaur Skeleton” sculpture, that took almost a whole summer to complete.

Weekender: What is your process for building art out of LEGO? Do you map it out or just jump right in?

Sawaya: I have used many methods to create my works. I use Brickpaper, which is a sort of graph paper but instead of being made up of squares, it is made up of rectangles the same size as the rectangular bricks. I can use this to sketch out my designs ahead of time. I have made pads of Brickpaper available on my Web site (brickartist.com) so that kids can plan out their own LEGO artwork.

At this point, I see the world in little rectangles. Sometimes I catch myself staring at a building or a person and breaking down how it would look like out of LEGO.

As for the process, I really try to envision what the final sculpture will look like prior to me putting down the first brick.

Weekender: How do you transport the pieces from show to show? Do you have to break them down at all?

Sawaya: I use a fine-art shipping company to transport the sculptures. The sculptures are glued together to keep them together while being shipped.

Weekender: Do you have a favorite LEGO piece you’ve made?

Sawaya: My favorite project is always my next one. I truly believe I can build anything out of LEGO, and I get excited about being challenged. I can’t wait to get my next commission!

Weekender: How did you get into art?

Sawaya: I had always been interested in creating. My parents encouraged it as I was growing up, so it makes sense that I would eventually find myself as a full time artist.

Weekender: What other media have you done work in?

Sawaya: Throughout my lifetime I have worked with several different types of media. For instance as a child, I often used Play-Doh. As an artist, I have worked with more traditional media such as clay and wire. I also did a series of sculptures using candy. The candy sculptures were similar to my LEGO work, as both are additive sculpting in nature, using small pieces to create the final form. Recently I did a large scale piece using only chocolate bars. I have also done pieces using bottle caps.

Weekender: Who were your artistic influences?

Sawaya: When I first started out, I was really inspired by an art book of (conceptual sculptor) Tom Friedman’s work. I was blown away by his fabulous sculptures created from household items. I would stare at this book for hours and let my mind wander. Recently I authored my own book to inspire others. I put together a collection of photos of my works over the past few years with the hopes that kids will read it and be inspired to become artists themselves.

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