Nathan Sawaya’s “The Art of the Brick” Builds Fans in Taiwan, Singapore
“The Art of the Brick”, Nathan Sawaya’s traveling exhibition of large-scale LEGO sculptures, is currently on display in both Singapore and Taiwan
Legos aren’t just for kids anymore- they’re now an artist’s medium. Full-time freelance artist Nathan Sawaya lives in New York City and owns an estimated 2.5 million of the famous toy building blocks. Instead of using them to create castles and cars however, he uses them to sculpt. He’s created a 20-foot long Tyrannosaurus Rex skeleton, a full-scale advertising billboard and “Yellow,” a man made of yellow bricks tearing his chest open to reveal a jumble of Legos inside.
Nathan Sawaya estimates he spends more than six figures on Lego bricks every year. Sculptures range in complexity as does the time it takes to create each one. Some take as little as just a few hours to complete, some take weeks or even months. As for brick usage, Sawaya reports a life-size human form takes anywhere from 15,000-25,000 pieces. His inspiration for his wide variety of work comes from personal experiences, emotions, journeys and of course, the Internet.
Nathan Sawaya’s creations have shown all over the world and now he’s taken his traveling exhibition to Asia. “The Art of the Brick” is currently on display in both Singapore and Taiwan and according to Sawaya, hopefully inspiring potential Lego artists.
Singapore’s show is taking place now until April 14th, 2013 at the ArtScience Museum at Marina Bay Sands. Sawaya often creates specialty pieces to reflect cities where his works will be seen. In the case of this show, it’s a 15,999-brick sculpture of the ArtScience Museum itself.
The current exhibit in Taiwan is actually the second in the country. “The Art of the Brick” first showed in Taipei and was a huge success. Its popularity boosted Sawaya’s Facebook friends on his Chinese-language page to more than 40,000, surpassing his friends on his English page. Now the exhibit has moved onto Kaohsiung’s The Pier 2 Art Center until February 17, 2013.
While pieces in the shows are not for sale, works by Sawaya fall into the five to six figure price range. It’s a far cry from the start of his career when he says gallery doors were slammed in his face. Today’s worldwide shows and high sales prices bring it all back to fun and games.