312 Ste. Catherine Ouest may resemble any other corporate building. However, upon walking through the gray facade and down a fluorescently lit hallway, visitors find themselves awe-inspired by an art exhibition that transformed something simple to remarkably powerful.
In Nathan Sawaya’s Art of the Brick, LEGO — a popular childhood obsession — has been reconstructed and reimagined into compelling structures of joy, grief, curiosity, and movement.
“Many of my works center on the phenomena of how everyday life, people and raw emotion are intertwined. I am inspired by my own experiences, the journeys I take and the people I meet,” Sawaya states in the exhibition display.
In this exhibit, there are more than one million LEGO pieces across over 130 separate works..
Unexpectedly, Sawaya’s career path did not originate in art. He obtained his bachelor’s and law degree from New York University, where he simultaneously developed a desire for a creative outlet. The solution to this itch was, as one could guess, LEGO. Although this hobby started in his office cubicle between stacks of paperwork, he quickly started gaining LEGO commissions from around the world.
Sawaya quit his attorney career to become a full-time LEGO artist and is now officially recognized as a Lego Certified Professional.
One of the first rooms of the exhibition features Sawaya’s iterations of famous paintings: Vincent van Gogh’s Starry Night, Frida Kahlo’s The Frame, and Edvard Munch’s The Scream. From a distance, these recreations may feel simplistic. Up close, however, it’s made clear that each brick is a deliberate choice, popping with intentional curves and texture that give the paintings a new light. Depth emerges from flatness as Sawaya converts two-dimensional canvases into tactile, dynamic mosaics.
In Starry Night, swirls of color pulse upward, transforming legos into modular motion. In The Frame, Kahlo’s portrait is a three-dimensional figure inside a hollow, box-like frame—breathing life back into Kahlo’s original painting. In The Scream, the methodical brick placement exudes the essence that the original painting intended to brew, showing off Sawaya’s stark attentiveness to precise curves, vivid colors, and fine details.
An adjacent gallery honors the Roman and Greek artistry as well as other historical stone sculptures in the form of fastidious LEGO reconstructions that capture the curvature and intention of the originals. Upon reading each of the placards, one can clearly see how Sawaya underwent the painstakingly difficult process to replicate the smooth curves and lines, ultimately crafting a balance between artistic tension and perfection. Additionally, LEGO adds a unique sense of fragility to the artwork as the imperfections are clearly visible in the sculptures.
Beyond the entrancing bright colors and intricate sculptures, the exhibition’s true emotional core appears in darker, more intimate galleries. Viewers are immersed in introspection as Sawaya displays his critiques and thoughts on human and societal perception, namely through his works titled Wall, Underneath, and Mask Construction. In Underneath, Sawaya has written on the placard: “If you were to pull back your skin and show what was Underneath, would it be so scary? A lot of the time, probably yeah.” The sculpture depicts a face being pulled down, revealing a discomforting image of a skeleton looking directly out at the viewer. Through this visual, visitors are confronted by the universal tension between public perception and private truth. Here, Sawaya uses LEGO as a profound commentary on deceptive human interactions in the modern-day world.
A keystone of the exhibition lies in a separate room. Made up of an entire summer’s worth of building, we can behold a 80,020 piece, a six-metre-long T. rex skeleton dominating the room with roaring majesty. Nearby, a LEGO safari-esque gallery reimagines nature in life-sized renditions of a wide range of wild animals. Flamingoes, giraffes, tigers: you name it. Each animal is in the foreground of a hyperrealistic photographic landscape which, in my experience, urges the viewer to consider environmental preservation and empathy for the endangerment of species worldwide. In this case, plastic bricks are both pure mesmerization and an homage to environmental sustainability.
Upon entering the final exhibition room, visitors are greeted by perhaps Sawaya’s most famous piece, Yellow — a human figure tears open its chest and bricks spill onto the stand, igniting eye-catching, tender sentiments to each viewer. Sawaya recognizes that the emotional and physical elements of Yellow are what garners so much attention from adults and children alike: “I think we grown-ups appreciate how cathartic ‘opening oneself up to the world’ can be for our souls. And the kids? Probably because yellow guts spilling onto the floor looks cool.” Although the piece may captivate its audience in these ways, Sawaya explains that for him, Yellow is ultimately about the “metamorphosis [he has] been through on [his] journeys.”
Finally, visitors enter the room where the primary sense becomes touch, rather than sight. Children and adults alike snap together bricks in their own, imaginative ways. I saw many creations, including boats and houses. Other ones weren’t exactly identifiable, but beautiful and creative nonetheless.
LEGO, in the meticulous hands of Nathan Sawaya, reveals the exceptional potential in turning structure into soul. Even if we may all not make LEGO our prized possession, by leaving the viewer with the same tools that he began with, Sawaya amplifies the idea that the artistry of these masterpieces lies as much in the creative process as in its finished versions. Journeying through Art of the Brick more than simply impresses the eye: it stimulates human connection and introspection, one brick at a time. As Sawaya puts it: “Art nurtures the brain. Whether made from clay, paint, wood or a modern-day toy.”
To Learn More:
Exhibition Website: https://theartofthebrickexpo.com/montreal/
Nathan Sawaya Website: https://nathansawaya.com/
Exhibition’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/artofthebrickexpo/
Nathan Sawaya’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nathansawaya/?hl=en