Legos used to be a hobby for Nathan Sawaya.
The internationally touring "brick artist" was originally a New York corporate lawyer who spent untold billable hours on mergers and acquisitions. He was miserable by the time he got home, but found solace in making sculptures out of Legos. After enough nights tinkering with plastic toy bricks, he realized he'd found his calling.
"My mantra is art is not optional," Sawaya said Wednesday. "Creating art makes you healthier, creating art makes you smarter. So really, creating art makes you a better person."
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Sawaya's feats of artistry and engineering will be on view at the Franklin Institute for nearly seven months starting Saturday. "The Art of the Brick," which features more than 100 creations, last visited Philadelphia in 2015. This time, it'll feature several new works, including 13 large-scale sculptures of endangered species. Placards next to each Lego creation include behind-the-scenes details, such as how many bricks went into it. The largest required 112,306.
The first two rooms of "The Art of the Brick" are dedicated to recreations of artistic masterpieces. Famous paintings like "Starry Night" and "Mona Lisa" line the walls, with a little more texture than their oil-based inspirations. Sawaya also plays with scale and dimension, transforming "Whistler's Mother," "American Gothic" and Frida Kahlo's "The Frame" into 3D sculptures. The anguished man in "The Scream" also stands apart from a flat background of swirling colors.
Classical sculptures get Lego-fied, too, with slight modifications. As Sawaya explains in a plaque next to his take on "Nike of Samothrace," the headless Greek sculpture that now stands in the Louvre, the recreation was scaled to about a third of the size of the original due to engineering concerns over the wings. Versions of the "Venus de Milo" and a Moai figure from Easter Island stand alongside it.
Art history gives way to the animal kingdom as visitors move through the exhibit, stumbling upon a 20-foot-long T-Rex skeleton and room full of endangered species. Some, like a pensive lowland gorilla, stand alone, while others travel in packs. A baby polar bear stands with its mother in the corner of the room, across from a gaggle of flamingos.
The exhibit opens onto a 9,000-square-foot play space where visitors can take a cue from Sawaya and build their own art.
"I hope an exhibit like this does encourage more creativity, creating art at home," he said. "Maybe you don't have to spend three months working on a giant Lego whale. You can just do a little more doodling, a little more finger painting with the kids and yes, even snap a few Lego bricks together."
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