Tag Archives: Art

Some LEGO builders elevate the form to fine art in its own right, while others enjoy reproducing famous works of art with the brick. Find beautiful and thought-provoking LEGO artwork right here.

Isembard Kingdom Brunel engineered from LEGO

This weekend sees The Great Western Brick Show take place in the UK at the STEAM Railway Museum in Swindon. Some of the displays this year will mark the fact that it’s 175 years since Isembard Kingdom Brunel opened his maintenance facility, whose surviving buildings house the museum. Jimmy Clinch has chosen to celebrate the occasion with a brilliant mosaic of the big man himself…

Brunel is something of a hero of mine: the most audacious engineer of the 19th century — a designer of tunnels, bridges, railway lines and enormous steamships. He’s a pinup-boy for any self-respecting steampunk fan and I would love to hang this mosaic on my wall.

I had a crack at building my own tribute to him a few years ago, recreating the famous image taken in front of the SS Great Eastern…

If you get the chance to make it to the show this weekend, show your respect with a doff of the top hat to Jimmy’s mosaic. I’m sure Isembard would appreciate it.

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The Creation of Minifig-kind

We’ve always known that the LEGO minifigure is awesome, but who’d have guessed it was divinely created? Thanks to Ki Young Lee, who has reinterpreted into LEGO form Michelangelo’s painting The Creation of Adam, which graces the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, we can at last see how the minifigure came into existance.

Still life painting of LEGO fruit and seafood

Joining the ranks of Caravaggio, Paul Cezanne, and van Gogh, birgburg has taken a break from depicting the human (or in our case, minifig) form and instead replicated a still-life basket of fruit with his paint and canvas (ie. LEGO bricks).

The composition of the still life is superb. I especially love how the builder has stacked the LEGO cherries to resemble a flowing bunch of grapes. But what really sells this LEGO painting for me is that gorgeously-gilded, over-the-top, ostentatious frame. I’ve definitely seen this kind of frame in art museums before. Interestingly, a tour guide at the Cleveland Museum of Art once explained to me that some works of art are left in their original frames, while other works at the museum are placed in newer (although still usually ancient) frames for aesthetic reasons. Real art buffs can spot these “frame upgrades” even when the age difference between the artwork and the frame is less than 100 years based on historical frame styles alone.

For this piece though, I’d say this is a frame upgrade. But only because I know the LEGO painting was completed last year and the frame is brand new.

Sometimes, the abyss stares back

This dragon model by Eero Okkomen has made me question how a LEGO creation can have so much personality. It proves an image can tell a story without an accompanying explanation — you don’t need to be told, you just know to fear and respect the summoned serpent.

I’ve always thought the Ninjago Morro Dragon set is a mine for amazing pieces, but I would have never in a thousand years have used the wings like this — awesome. And that face — so much expression with so few pieces. The smoke coming from the nostrils is just brilliant, and so are the electric moustaches. Overall, this model is an art piece, and I wouldn’t mind displaying it in my living room, like an ukiyo-e style sculpture.

Creepily colorful LEGO skulls

David Hughes is building a series of wonderfully creepy LEGO skulls. They have a definite Mexican Day Of The Dead vibe going on with bold color choices and geometric patterns. Our hobby is generally dominated by minifig-scale models depicting scenes or vehicles — sometimes it makes for a pleasant change when we get these kind of larger-scale art pieces beautifully put together from good old-fashioned bricks.

Stunning LEGO A Link Between Worlds mosaic

While I have not yet played this particular title in the Legend of Zelda series, the LEGO mosaic version of Link in wall merged form built by Hans Demol is instantly recognizable. In game, Link can take the form of a wall painting to traverse the worlds and puzzles in interesting ways, and Hans shows this with a stacked plates mosaic style that works well for both the painted Link and the uneven brick wall texture.

In this close-up of Link’s face, you can see several different colors used to achieve the painted look.

The Edge: Step into a LEGO painting

It’s not often that I see a LEGO creation and think to myself “this is art.” But Lukasz Wiktorowicz‘s most recent build, “the Edge” certainly is art. Using both classic architecture and surrealist imagery, Lukasz created an absolutely stunning build. The proportions on this thing are spot on and the details are ridiculously, well, detailed. But what really pushes this build over the top is Lukasz’s out-of-the-box building techniques.

Normally I’m a stickler for lining up LEGO bricks perfectly (90 or 180 degree angles only, people!). A little crease from a cattywampus brick in an otherwise smooth wall is a downright sin in my book. But Lukasz purposefully stacked the bricks in his four pillars all askew and the resulting texture is fantastic! Another creative feature of this build is the base. When I accumulate a boxful of seemingly useless bricks, I shove them to the back of my shelf and forget about them. Instead of doing the same, Lukasz used those ball socket bricks to create an unconventional base for his build that makes the whole thing look like it is floating. Well done all around.

The Vitruvian LEGO Cat

You may be familiar with the Vitruvian Man, a drawing by Leonardo da Vinci showing the human body’s proportions, but have you seen flambo14‘s Vitruvian LEGO Cat?

According to the text of da Vinci’s original:

“if you open your legs enough that your head is lowered by one-fourteenth of your height and raise your hands enough that your extended fingers touch the line of the top of your head, know that the centre of the extended limbs will be the navel, and the space between the legs will be an equilateral triangle”

In the case of flambo14’s cat:

“if you look cute and purr, then no one will notice that you are out of proportion”

Original Star Wars movie poster recreated in LEGO

Gamabomb‘s latest model is a fantastic recreation of the original 1977 Star Wars movie poster. While the large figures of Luke and Leia have been effectively crafted using bricks (check out the abs on Luke!), the builder has also cleverly used minifigs of C3PO and R2D2 to represent the famous droids as they appeared in the original print, while the sinister Vader looms out of the background shadows. All in all, this is an excellent version of an iconic image, immediately recognisable even as a thumbnail, yet rewarding of a zoom-in to catch all the details. The Force is strong with this one.

Cool cubism

Here’s a wonderful geometric creation from Wami Delthorn. LEGO lends itself perfectly to these sort of repeating-pattern artistic constructions — it’s a shame we don’t see more of them.

If you look at the center of this image for long enough it starts to flip back and forth in a good example of the Necker Cube illusion. I could stare at this thing all day!

French artist builds huge metal LEGO minifigures that are completely poseable

Ever wanted a giant LEGO minifigure? French artist Mat Green, who specializes in welding, decided to put his considerable metal-working skills to use crafting these remarkably accurate renditions of a LEGO minifigure and a LEGO skeleton. Mat tells us it took him two months to craft the minifigure, whom he’s named Hugo. Hugo weighs 110 pounds and stands over four feet tall. The coolest thing about Hugo though, is that he’s just as poseable as his plastic siblings. Mat then created Pablo, whom he says is a Mexican punk rocker skeleton. Pablo weighs 130 pounds, and comes with a removable Mohawk.

See more of Hugo and Pablo

Enter the brick outpost

Cole Blaq continues his series of fascinating artistic takes on a scaled up 2×4 brick, called Enter The Brick, with a Classic Space themed brick. This one is one of my favorites in the series. While I’m not nostalgic for the theme since it was well before my time, I enjoy the simplicity of the build, much like the sets in the Classic Space era. One of the studs propped up as a satellite dish is just the right amount of detail.