Lego bricks star of new Walnut Creek exhibit
By Lou Fancher
Like an announcement that creative expression should be accessible to every man, woman and, most importantly, child, Lego brick sculptures by New York artist Nathan Sawaya convert the iconic childhood toys into life-size (or larger) people, dogs, skulls, cellos, trees and even a T. rex dinosaur.
The works are front and center at Walnut Creek's Bedford Gallery, which kicks off its 2015-16 Art + Play season with "The Art of the Brick," running through Dec. 20. The exhibition features 27 sculptures by Sawaya and seven large-scale tableau compositions from "In Pieces," a collaboration between Sawaya and photographer Dean West. In a thematically related exhibit, San Francisco artist Jud Bergeron's celebration of parenting, titled "Became," presents boisterous and bold sculptures made from toylike pieces in the Alcove Gallery.
A fan of Lego-inspired art, Bedford Gallery curator Carrie Lederer is glad to be hosting Sawaya's traveling exhibit and notes he is hardly the only one to use the famed toy bricks for grander artistic ideas.
"I'm an avid participant on the Pinterest platform and for many years have been 'pinning' artworks made from Lego bricks," says Lederer.
Among her selections: graffiti artist Jan Vormann's series of works showing Lego bricks filling in gaps and holes in real-life gray brick structures; Cuban collective Los Carpinteros' large abstract sculptures; and hundreds of thousands of Lego pieces fashioned into enormous portraits of dissidents by artist Ai Weiwei in a 2014 exhibit at Alcatraz.
Sawaya's sculptures veer toward contemporary narratives: a tiny man caught in the oversized pinch of a large gray hand ("Strength of Spirit"); a woman's empty, windswept dress breaking apart ("Red Dress").
Born in Colville, Washington, in 1973 and raised in Veneta, Oregon, Sawaya has his first Lego experience with a universal building kit.
"It had doors, windows and other things. The first thing I built was a little house," he says.
Grand ambition arrived at age 10, when his parents denied his request for a dog.
"I tore down houses and buildings I'd built and made a life-size dog, a boxer," he recalls. "It was the first moment I realized the toy could be more than a toy. If I wanted to be a rock star, I could build a guitar."
After graduating from New York University School of Law and becoming a corporate lawyer, Sawaya realized personal and professional fulfillment would come from art, not legal arbitration. He began making art from Lego bricks in 2002 and says his initial forays were largely representational.
"I was trying to capture things I saw around my apartment," he says. "As I got more confident, I found human forms were my passion."
Lederer says one of her favorites, the 11,014-piece "Yellow," took Sawaya two years to construct.
"He conceived the idea in 2004 when he was preparing to leave his law firm job," she says. "He sketched 'Yellow' hundreds of times before clicking the first bricks into place."
The bust of a man, yellow bricks gushing out of a gash he's torn open in his chest, follows Sawaya's trademark style: a monochromatic palette depicting an emotionally resonant theme but not a specific type of person.
"The entire reason I use Legos this way is to make it accessible to people," he says, adding, "The emotion infused into the sculptures -- that's therapeutic."
It can also be autobiographical. In a work titled "Gray," which shows a man tearing his way out of a box, was inspired by Sawaya's struggles with depression. "The sculpture was like a release," he says.
"Brick" has traveled worldwide, and Sawaya says generalities about the reactions are rare. "It's all across the board. Some kids love the dinosaur (regrettably not part of the Bedford exhibit). It reminds them that a gigantic thing can be made out (of) a toy they play with. Other kids relate to an apple or a 2-inch figure. Adults look for meaning in the works."
He has not been content with personal fulfillment and critical attention, His most ambitious construction might be Art Revolution Foundation, a nonprofit that brings art instruction and tools back into classrooms where arts funding has been dropped.
"Raising awareness is one aspect, but for me, it's about encouraging art. I want to provide schools and therapeutic health programs the tools to create art." A percentage of T-shirt and limited edition sculpture sales will support grants. Art Revolution expects to announce recipients later this year.