Zatth Blag

Nathan Sawaya's "Art of the Brick"

Mon, 17 Jun 2013 22:15:00 +0000

For the past month, when not finishing school, becoming 18, or graduating, I have been working relentlessly as a hermit in my basement on multiple projects for BrickFair, thus staving off the process of once again writing for this blag.

So contrary to popular belief, I am not dead, just being productive... during summer.

Ugh.

Anywho, yesterday I was lucky enough to go to Nathan Sawaya's "Art of the Brick" Exhibit in NYC, and thought that not only would this audience enjoy hearing about it, but it could also get me back into blagging. Who knows, I might actually learn how to post images to show pics of what I've been working on recently.

Now I assume you guys know Nathan Sawaya, but if you don't, the image of a yellow LEGO statue breaking open its chest should ring a bell... or whatever the equivalent idiom is that applies to an image, rather than a name or a noise. The exhibition opened up a few days ago in Times Square, and I was lucky to be in the city yesterday and today. So naturally I dragged my mother and my two aunts to go to the exhibition with me.

We were greeted by a sign that prohibited the use of cameras for photos or videos, which made me very sadfaecd, as the only place where pictures could be taken was next to a LEGO sculpture of a "man" sitting in a chair.

However, that sadness quickly vanished as we entered the exhibition and were greeted by Nathan Sawaya's recreations of famous artworks. Pieces like Edvard Munch's "The Scream", the Lascaux Caves "Horse", and Gustav Klimt's "The Kiss" were recreated in a unique way; while the background of the image (such as Munch's sundown-background and Klimt's brown background) was modeled a-la LEGO mosaic, Sawaya built the main figures in a 3D way, and so, for example, you could examine the screaming face from all angles, and Sawaya's vision of what it would be like if it sprung from out of the painting. In other areas, famous paintings were recreated a-la mosaic. The beauty in these was not the process of recreating the arwtork (PicToBrick can already do that), but rather looking at the original and seeing what colors, building techniques, and pieces Sawaya used to remake the piece of work out of LEGO. My favorite of these was Rembrandt's "1657 Self Portrait", as Sawaya used only a mixture of three different brown and orange colors, built as a side view LEGO mosaic, to accurately portray the shadows created on the human skin in the painting.

Later on, we were greeted by Michelangelo's "David" as the next room had famous statues and structures rebuilt in LEGO. The most imposing was a Moai head from Easter Island, to scale. It was quite monumental.

Now these pieces were all amazing as they were accurate yet jaw-dropping representations of famous artwork, but then came the part I was truly excited for: Sawaya's own art. Up to this point for my mom, she was just going through another version of BrickFair, where a fan decided to pay homage to something that already existed through LEGO.

I cannot hope to describe all of Sawaya's artwork present at the exhibition, mainly because much of it can be seen on the gallery of his website. And we all know how amazing it looks from those pictures. The truly beautiful part of the exhibition was that each piece was accompanied by a little message from Nathan to us about what the piece meant. So while Sawaya built a giant peace sign out of all-colored bricks, he explained that the only way to achieve peace in the world was by joining all the colors of the world together. While Sawaya delighted us with statues of three figures with a sphere, a cube, and a pyramid as a head, he explained that if everyone in the world looked the same it would all be boring, and that he wanted us to consider how the triangle, square and circle, along with the colors red, blue and yellow, were basic components in architecture or colors. In this sense, Sawaya was able to truly transform the already beautiful structures into art with a message, a philosophy. At this point I became aware this stopped being an exhibition for my inner LEGO enthusiast to gawk at and consider all the building techniques and pieces used; now it was a fantastic art exhibition, where each piece of art conveyed a different message about the artist, about human nature, about ourselves.

I must admit I was heartbroken when the exhibition ended, and I walked out to purchase a book of Sawaya's art and a t-shirt. But to see how this exhibition had spoken not only to me, but to my family and to the other tourists, was very encouraging.

If there's one thing I can take from the exhibition, and that you should too if you cannot attend (though, please, by any means possible try to go at least once), is the very first piece that greeted us in the exhibition officially and which is on the shirt I bought yesterday and am now wearing: a giant grey LEGO hand holding a simple 3x2 red brick, reminding us that it all begins with just one brick.

So keep imagining.

Halfway Out of the Dark

Wed, 13 Feb 2013 00:42:00 +0000

So this month and the coming weeks will be quite important.

I have 100 days left as a Senior.

I'm being auctioned off tomorrow at our school's Guy Auction.

The medical treatment I've been on for about three months that has made my daily life more annoying than it was is hopefully ending this week.

Our school has raised I think over $20,000 during February for Leukemia and Lymphoma Month.

February 20th is Rare Disease Day, and for that I'm gonna be writing articles for my school newspaper, making a symbolic painting for this year's theme, and a cover of Give A Little Bit with facts about Rare Diseases.

Yay for having a life, I guess.

What's everyone else up to?

Mr. Ramirez Goes To College

Sat, 19 Jan 2013 04:10:00 +0000

Yep, you heard right. George Mason University Class of 2017. I'm super excited, since I already know people entering, have a spot guaranteed on the Forensics Team, and got accepted into the Honors College.

Also, I live 45 mins away from BrickFair VA, the campus is 10 mins away from BrickFair VA, so I know for a fact that attending BrickFair is still a definite yes in my future.

College... Huh.

Guy Auction

Fri, 11 Jan 2013 02:21:00 +0000

So during February our school does a bunch of events to raise money for Leukemia and Lymphoma research. One of said events is Guy Auction, where the ladies (or lads, if they're willing to) can bid on guys to go on dates.

Apparently I have been chosen to be auctioned off.

Yikes.

But in all seiousness, if it helps to defeat cancer I'll do it.

Also I might trick girls into hanging out with me, which is like an added bonus.

dust blows off keyboard

Mon, 07 Jan 2013 02:27:00 +0000

Oh hi there, blag.

I'd almost forgotten about you.

So, what've I missed?

The World War Z trailer

Fri, 09 Nov 2012 04:30:00 +0000

Ehhhh, I don't know how to feel about it.

I worry that in the movie the brilliance of the book of looking at the impact of the zombie apocalypse on the world in social, religious, economic, political, and sanitary matters will be completely tossed aside just to make another action movie starring a famous actor in an apocalypse scenario.

I really hope they keep that in the movie, at least...

Anyone else read the book/seen the trailer?

Updates on Life, The Universe, and Everything

Thu, 01 Nov 2012 21:13:00 +0000

So Cloud Atlas was brilliant, and I cannot recommend the movie and the book enough. LIKE, GO WATCH/READ IT NAO.

Bought a mini-megaphone that lets me replicate Bane's voice. It is way too much time, and it detracts from my time allocated to real life activities.

NaNoWriMo began again! I'm writing a sequel to last year's novel, and hope to make it twice as long!

To finish this update off, here's a Twitter conversation between Chols and myself:

Chols: Every time I get hit by a hurricane, I join a new Bionicle site. This cannot be a coincidence.
Zatth: ARE YOU A WIZARD
Chols: YEAH I'M A WIZARD
Zatth: ARE YOU... A WOLFEN WIZARD?! (ALLITERATION EFF TEE DUBYA)
Chols: YOU ALREADY KNOW THE ANSWER
Zatth: Wait... If you know what my answer is... YOU CAN SEE INTO MY MIND?! Do you have Teleportesis, Wolfen Wizard?

I Expect Cloud Atlas

Fri, 26 Oct 2012 20:40:00 +0000

to blow my mind in the cinema, just as the book has done. I've seen the trailer about 30 times now (talk about obsession), so I'm sure the movie will be wonderful.

We'll see.

I Cannot Wait

Sat, 06 Oct 2012 22:38:00 +0000

to finish Cloud Atlas, as well as the release of the movie.

Because I will be reviewing the heck out of both.

Because they are beautiful.

'Nuff said.

Ever Have One Of Those Days...

Sat, 06 Oct 2012 20:13:00 +0000

when you just randomly decide to show all of your classmates at school a GIF of you?

And then they just stare...