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 | Looking at LEGO Art Article by Brendan Powell Smith |
The Brick Testament on display. Photo provided by Diana Majdakova, courtesy of SPACE Gallery
SPACE Gallery, Lazaretská 9, Bratislava, Slovakia
18 April - 10 June, 2007
I had never been inside an art gallery before, much less had my own work displayed in one. So it was with great surprise back in January that I received an invitation from a gallery in Bratislava, Slovakia to participate in an exhibit about the use of LEGO in contemporary art. I was flattered of course, but unless they could pay my way over to Europe, it seemed unlikely I could attend. I was then even more surprised when a couple of months later they contacted me again to say they had arranged to use some grant money to cover the cost of my travel. So I packed up a version of “The Last Supper” and “The Garden of Eden” and got on a plane to Slovakia.
I was not the only artist to attend. John Cake and Darren Neave (a.k.a. The Little Artists) from the UK had brought with them a few of their miniature LEGO recreations of well-known works of modern art (along with minifig versions of the respective artists). A talented Slovakian artist named Stano Masar had some of his LEGO work on display. And although not able to attend in person, the infamous fake LEGO box art of Polish artist Zbigniew Libera was on display; featuring the stacked piles of skeleton minifigs in Nazi concentration camps.
Closeup of a Little Artist display (left) and Little Artist display. Closeup provided by Diana Majdakova, courtesy of SPACE Gallery.
Since it was impossible to travel with it intact, much of my first day in Bratislava was spent working at a feverish pace to reconstruct the lavishly-decorated Garden of Eden sprawling over six baseplates. Seeing the Little Artist’s work so professionally displayed inside transparent Perpsex cubes atop custom-made plinths made me feel sort of amateurish for just plopping my stuff down on top of a table (with nothing to it set off from the rest of the world as ‘art’). But then again, I am an amateur in this world, whereas my cohorts from the UK had attended art school and this was not the first time they’d had their work on display in galleries.
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| I was heartened, however, to see how great the two big enlargements of images from The Brick Testament looked when hung on gallery’s walls (even if unframed). And best of all was the eye-catching 50-foot long banner across the gallery’s exterior displaying all 17 images “Accept Communism or Die” story from the book of Acts (which curator Juraj Carný chose surely in part for its added meaning to citizens of a former Eastern Bloc nation). |
The gallery opening was that evening and drew a crowd of about fifty. After Juraj gave an introductory talk about the show and introduced the visiting artists (all in Slovakian, so we can only hope he said nice things), we mingled with the attendees. For a couple of hours I did my best to field questions about my techniques and motivations with several people who spoke varying amounts of English.
Visitors examining a poster from the Brick Testament (left) and The Reverend Brendan Powell Smith. Smith photo provided by Diana Majdakova, courtesy of SPACE Gallery
Over the following two days I spent a good deal of time tagging along with Juraj and the Little Artists, visiting just about all of Bratislava’s other notable art galleries and even gave a short talk at the city’s Academy of Fine Arts. It was a bit of a fish-out-of-water experience for someone far more used to the casualness and unpretentiousness of LEGO conventions. Some of my preconceived notions about art galleries proved accurate (people really do stand around sipping red wine), while other things surprised me--after a while I began to notice that it was by and large different configurations of the same 100 artists and art students at each gallery we visited. I hadn’t realized how much networking and not-so-subtle self-promotion goes on at such events. I guess I naïvely expected more curious non-artist types off the street. Probably my favorite moment at the gallery was the day after the opening when a group of ten high school age kids came in and were very curious about The Brick Testament and had lots of great questions.
Closeup of a Little Artists display(left) and gallery visitors. Closeup photo provided by Diana Majdakova
courtesy of SPACE Gallery
These observations are certainly not intended to cast any aspersions. I had an absolute blast. John and Darren of the Little Artists were great tour guides into this new world, and were as much at home talking about the nitty-gritty of LEGO-building and the frustrations of hard-to-acquire parts as they were discussing the meaning and merit of various instances of contemporary art. Juraj and everyone at the SPACE gallery were also most gracious and accommodating. I would certainly recommend the experience to anyone in a heartbeat.
And as was likely the main idea behind organizing this show in the first place, the experience really got me thinking about the whole idea of LEGO creations as works of art and LEGO as an artistic medium.
Just don’t go looking for me at the local art gallery now that I’m back in the States, unless my stuff is on display. Because I have to say, giant blow-ups of LEGO images look really freaking cool.
Other Links:
The Brick Testament
SPACE Gallery
http://priestor.crazycurators.org/index.php?Idx1=2&Idx2=1&Params[id]=36
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