Art Blog - The Artist's Muse

While in NYC last week I visited the Agora Gallery in Chelsea to preview an exhibition of work by Nathan Sawaya. Sawaya has chosen a unique medium for his fine art, Lego building blocks. He cleverly assembles the rectangular colored bricks to form the natural curves of the human body. This is no easy task. When the sculpture is viewed from different angles it resembles a topographical map. Gazing at a sculpture from the front, the way it is intended to be viewed, the perspective is quite different. The gradated "steps" create the illusion of cheek bones, noses, pectoral and gluteus muscles. Each sculpture is monochromatic and most have Lego bricks spilling out on to the pedestals possibly representing the figure's internal organs in a literal and figurative manner. Some of the figures are missing hands or other limbs, which sit in crumbled piles on the pedestal beneath where they should be attached.

Sawaya also works in 2-D, creating wall-mounted pointillist images with the rectangular colored bricks. Up close they look like an assemblage of color. When the viewer steps away, an image appears.

The D'Amour Museum of Fine Arts, part of the Springfield Museum complex in Western Massachusetts, is excited to host an exhibition of Sawaya's work which opens to the public on June 16, 2010. We have custom-designed pedestals for each of the 30 + works and Sawaya will make an appearance at the member's opening. He returns on July 31, to conduct a sculpture-building demonstration. The exhibition title, Art of the Brick, of course!

For more information: http://agora-gallery.com/artistpage/nathan_sawaya.aspx

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