LEGOS AND CONCEPTUAL ART.
LEGOS AND CONCEPTUAL ART. I find a lot of conceptual art unsatisfactory, but I love the Lego project. 1. A lot of conceptual art bears only a few moments of looking. If you watch people at an exhibit of conceptual art, they will glance at a work for a few moments, take in the concept and move on. 2. Each Lego work is a new experience, rather than a single concept. 3. The works are beautiful. 4. Most important to me is that the Legos make me look harder and differently at buildings. 5. The Lego projects reflect craftsmanship. 6. If you like concept art because you can talk about concepts, the Lego projects provide lots of material for abstract generalizations: the contrast between bright colors and stone, the contrast between modern industrialized plastic and artisanal stone, the playfulness of toys and the seriousness of buildings, the contrast in scale between the Legos and the blocks of stone, the impermanence of stone and the seeming permanence of plastic, the parallels between building with blocks and building with stone—-it’s the same process after all….
Yes, if you think about it, plastic is less erodible than stone, but there’s also a paradox: Legos seem less permanent because they are less massive, seemingly poorer at load-bearing, more toy-like.