Friday, December 4, 2009

Lego Art



The Block Art

When I first saw this picture I just couldn't believe it was made entirely out of legos, or small plastic building blocks that children play with. The planning and design aspect is enormous, because the artist had to have carefully planned out were each piece had to go before he built it. And also, make sure that it looked symmetrical, as shown by the yellow man ripping himself open to reveal what he's made of: legos.





In fact, Nathan Sawaya, the artist responsible for these lego creations has an exhibit of lego people shown in yellow, blue, and red. I think it is really spectacular to see the amount of emotion in these "brick people", and how not any of the lego sculptures are fully constructed. By leaving parts out it seems to me he is saying that all people can fall apart.







I also found this lego video for fun: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmWWfnKVbYY

Chalk, Street Art (cont.)



The street art i was looking at in my last blog dealt with 3-D imagery, and trying to get the picture to pop out. In this type of street art, the artist uses chalk and Michelangelo's "God Creates Man" painting from the Sistine Chapel ceiling as a reference to create his own copy of the masterpiece. Personally, I thought the artist did a great rendition of the original piece, spending countless hours and getting all of the details to match up. I wondered though, how was it different using chalk to copy a fresco painting. Did the difference in materials make it harder or easier? It was painstaking either way, because in the video of the artist making this modern copy, it took him 3 solid days of intense work to complete it.

Here is the video link here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRmbhCs3A2k

I just think that this re-do of this Michelangelo piece shows just how popular Renassiance art is even today, and that it is easily recognizable and shows up countless times in our lives.

Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Sidewalk Art

I have always wondered how artists have been able to use perspective and original designs to create street art. I have seen some of these designs and I am amazed at how realistic and complicated they are. They are usually made with chalk, and take hours upon hours to complete. Sometimes even using the surrounding buidings and objects to complete the design.






This amazing piece is by Edgar Muller and is a "Lava Burst [that] transformed a typical German street into a scene from the apocalypse for the 30th anniversary of the international competition of street painters in Geldern". When I first saw this picture I thought it had to be a digtal design, because the level of detail and pure scale of this project seemed so immense. I also though how he used the cars parked on the strret and the manhole cover integrated into the desgin was brilliant.




This large canyon picture was another amazing piece by Muller. I looked into it more online and found a video of him actually making it, and thought the process was very intricate.

Here is the link for the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3SNYtd0Ayt0