Sean's LEGO blog

LEGO stadium on MLB.com

2008-10-22T09:17:00.003-05:00

Major League Baseball did a short interview about my new Yankee Stadium sculpture...

Watch the interview on MLB.com. (4 minutes)

Two short orders: the financial crisis hits LEGO town

2008-10-16T12:30:00.003-05:00

31" x 18" x 23" ; 8,250 LEGO elements. Completed October 14, 2008

This sculpture is an observation on the financial crisis currently engulfing the world.

Background

September 15, 2008 marked the start of a financial crisis worse than anything in our lifetimes.

Like two giant stones thrown into a pond, the sudden and total collapse of two very big, very old companies (Lehman Brothers and AIG) caused ripples in our economy. It was becoming clear that the systems we use to control and organize money just don't work.

Every day for weeks, the ripples grew. The world's financial systems begin to fall apart at the seams. Major banks folded. Big companies were going bankrupt. The stock market was bleeding. People's retirements savings were wiped out. And the governments of the world panicked, spending unheard-of amounts of money to try to fix the problem. No one is sure how or when this will end...

A short order

In the stock market, big time investors can place what's called a "short order" to make money off falling prices. They profit when everyone else is losing. It's symbolic of the entire investment banking industry: a way for the rich and powerful to make tons of money off all of the hard working people in the world.

A short order cook

At my local deli, the short order cook leaves a jar on top of the counter for tips. The day after this crisis began I was getting some eggs for breakfast and noticed that the cook had written on the tip cup: "Euro & Peso accepted too". It seemed symbolic of the entire crisis, and begged the question, "is the sun setting on the United States?"

I realized that both the short order cook and the short order investor were in the same financial mess... But at least this time, the hard working person was the one making the money.

This tip cup from my local deli inspired this sculpture.

Rebuilding the house that Ruth built: Yankee Stadium in LEGO bricks

2008-09-20T16:44:00.002-05:00

September 21, 2008 marks the closing of Yankee Stadium, an 85-year-old piece of New York history that is being supplanted by a newer, bigger stadium.

Together with a Manhattan gradeschooler and over 45,000 LEGO bricks, I have been building a sculpture of Yankee Stadium over the past three years. It will be complete in the next few months; these preview photos give you an in-progress look at the sculpture. The sculpture is 5 feet wide and 5 feet long, built to an approximate scale of 1:150.

The "fa�ade" (above) is a unique feature of Yankee Stadium that fans know and recognize. It was very important to get this visual feature correct!

"Monument park" (above) includes placards and monuments to famous Yankees players, like Babe Ruth, Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, and Lou Gherig.

The building is built to look as it does to this day, including all of the modifications that were made over the history of the building (above). When complete, it will be populated with tons of miniature people, hot dog vendors, scoreboards, and more.

An elevated train line runs alongside the stadium. When complete, it will contain a microscale New York City subway train, with lots of traffic and crowds on the street below!

Batter up!

Working on the stadium
I am building the sculpture together with a Manhattan grade schooler. We began work on the sculpture in February 2006, working whenever the boy had available time. The pictures below were taken during the course of 2006, 2007, and 2008.

The stadium will be complete in a few months -- Check back soon for an update!

50 Years of LEGO bricks (and 30ish years of Sean)

2008-08-12T19:39:00.000-05:00

New for 2008, the book 50 Years of the LEGO Brick presents the LEGO brick's history as well as stories around its creation and its use by children and adults everywhere.

I am very proud to have been a part of this book and to be a part of the new history of LEGO toys.

The book contains historic photos, removable reprints from old LEGO catalogs, and interviews with LEGO designers, LEGO fans, and more.

I have been featured throughout the book, most prominently in a five-page section that begins with my quote, "I am a child by profession." The book includes stories about my work as a LEGO Certified Professional, photos of many of my LEGO creations, as well as some quotes.

You can buy it on Amazon.com (About $50).
(Also available in German: 50 Jahre LEGO Stein)

Lucky 8 : A tribute to China

2008-08-09T00:03:00.001-05:00

On 08/08/08 at 8pm, all of the worlds eyes turn to China as it hosts the 2008 Olympic games. This will be a great moment for China, who is now given a historic chance to showcase its culture and its country to the world. Millions of people who never would have visited China or learned anything about it are now visiting and seeing the country at its proudest and most glorious.

It is China's moment to shine and to show the world how much of an amazing place it is; and I wanted to celebrate this momentous occasion in sculpture.

See more photos and read what the heck this thing is supposed to be

Guess how many pieces; win a real car!

2008-07-22T16:56:00.004-05:00

In spring 2008, Mazda commissioned LEGO sculptures of their sporty hatchback car, the MazdaSpeed3... one for every dealership in Mexico. They are on display at auto dealerships across the country throughout July and August 2008.

More photos and contest information

Empire State Building LEGO sculpture atop the real building

2008-06-26T11:30:00.003-05:00

I recently finished a sculpture of the Empire State Building that was installed atop the real Empire State Building. The sculpture was commissioned as the centerpiece of the Empire State Building's observation deck gift shop. Yesterday's official announcment marked the opening of the store! The sculpture is now on permanent display high above New York City.

The building is over 4 feet tall and contains 13,000 LEGO pieces. There's also a great little "very New York" street scene at the base of the model.

Read more and see photos

ZOOMy portrait

2008-06-25T11:37:00.000-05:00

Earlier this year I was commissioned to create a portrait of Marcos Wesley, the president of LEGO ZOOM, a division of LEGO Education in Brazil. His fantastic education programs, charity, and events reach over 1 million students across Brazil.

More pictures

SUV

2008-05-07T20:08:00.005-05:00

I'll never understand Americans' obsession with SUVs.

3 more pictures

Maintaining normality

2008-04-08T16:39:00.003-05:00

This was a sculpture that I first thought up over a year and a half ago, and really wanted to do as a life-size figure. I never seem to have the time, however, so I finally decided just to create it as a small sculpture.

More pictures

This piece was inspired by one of my sayings, "everything familiar is normal". We get so accustomed to the things in our life -- whether they're good or not -- that we don't see them for what they are. It's why people behave terribly or not, why cars run on gas or not, why we get fat or not, etc. Sooner or later, if we don't take a fresh, "lets-pretend-its-not-normal" look at things, we may be surprised that our entire world -- physically, socially, and spiritually -- has become a terrible mess.

Happy Birthday! The LEGO brick turns 50

2008-01-28T08:29:00.000-05:00

50 years ago, the 2x4 LEGO brick was born. In honor of the momentous occasion, I used LEGO bricks to build something that looked like a cake that looked something like a LEGO brick. It made sense at the time.

I think I baked the LEGO cake too long, because it was very crunchy. My dentist is happy about this.

It seems odd that, although I've has been building and playing with LEGO bricks for 30 years, that the LEGO brick itself is even two decades older than that. It's like a grandparent... or perhaps more like that weird uncle that brings fruitcakes on Thanksgiving.

Make a wish! I wish for 50 more years of LEGO bricks.

Holiday benefit for 1,300 kids

2007-12-19T18:10:00.000-05:00

The United Way and Monster.com held a holiday party for 1,300 underprivileged children. I built a big LEGO snowman with the children, and provided tens of thousands of LEGO bricks for them to create their own little masterpieces.

The snowman sculpture was fairly basic in form, since it needed to be built in under 3 hours. When complete, it used about 4,500 LEGO bricks and stood about 2 feet tall.

Kids had fun attaching their own creations to the snowman, like hats, droids, and icicle snow boogers.

Mini LEGO trophy for a Community Guy

2007-12-12T12:48:00.000-05:00

This miniature trophy was created for the winner of the 2007 Sharing is Participation community contest.

The small LEGO sculpture features a golden (...yellow) trophy, backdropped by a three-dimensional interpretation of the CommunityGuy.com logo. Realizing the logo's two-dimensional three-point-perspective is too much math for an artist, this interpretation came as a stroke of frustration-wrapped-brilliance.

Man builds dog

2007-12-07T12:33:00.000-05:00

Today I finished my first non-human LEGO portrait. (Unless you count my self-portrait; people do accuse me of being from Mars.)

Like most dogs, this adorable friend is about 2 feet tall and contains over 3,000 LEGO bricks.

Zara the amazing LEGO dog also knows plenty of tricks, like "sit", "play dead" and "get bumpy". And Zara sleeps at the front door to protect yourself from barefoot burglers in the night!

Sneak preview

2007-11-08T09:47:00.000-05:00

Hi everybody! I know I've been a bad blogger over the past few months -- I haven't added any new posts in a while, and I haven't updated the What's new page in my portfolio in a few months, either.

But don't worry -- I haven't been sitting on my well-callussed thumbs. I've got some really cool stuff in the works that I can't share with you just yet, but it's cool, so just think of something cool, and maybe that's what I'm working on.

Or you can look at these intentionally cryptic sneak preview photos. :)

New Yorker of the Week

2007-07-05T12:50:00.000-05:00

I was recently named "New Yorker of the Week" by Columbia News Tonight.

Watch the video, 2.5 minutes. (Sean Kenney : LEGO artist, "New Yorker of the Week"

Gallery Opening

2007-05-01T12:52:00.000-05:00

LEGO William Shatner

The Shatner Show web site has been updated with more information about the group exhibition in which I'll be participating this summer.

In addition, you can now purchase a 128-page, full-color book featuring the work of the 76 artists at the show. The preview of the book (below) shows a preview of my LEGO sculpture.

William Shatner exists mostly as a parody of himself, and has become so as the culmination of the roles he's played throughout his life. My piece features Shatner as "Denny Crane", his most recent role from TV's "Boston Legal". He is surrounded by his past, rendered as miniature models of himself in different roles. A LEGO Captain Kirk, the businessman from "Nightmare at 20,000 feet", and singing for his album "Has Been" in his highly gestured, slowly animated way.

Come see the exhibit this June, July, and August in Calgary, AB, Canada. 10% of sales will go to charity.

LEGOOG

2007-04-19T04:17:00.000-05:00

It's LEGoogle! I mean LooGoo! I mean GoGo! I mean GooLeg! I mean Loogle. I mean.. Oh, you know what I mean.

I had a lot of fun creating this sculpture for Google. At first, it looks like a normal sculpture or mosaic... but if you look closely, you can see that it's built entirely out of crazy-shaped LEGO bricks, like slopes, circles, hinges, wheels, flags, doors...

This logo is about "the complexity of simplicity", which is one of the things I admire most about Google's products. I've written a bit more about this and posted 7 photos in my online portfolio.

The colors in Google's logo are really well suited for LEGO... and I also realized while doing this project that "LEGO" and "Google" are witten using the same 4 letters. Neat.

Plastic Shatner

2007-04-16T10:56:00.000-05:00

Earlier this year, I was invited to participate in "The Shatner Show", a gallery exhibition featuring 76 artists' interpretations of William Shatner.

I produced a sculpture that will be showing this June, July, and August at the Uppercase Gallery in Calgary, Canada. (map)

Read more about The Shatner Show or the wonderfully-named Captain's Blog.

Sorry for only posting a teaser photo, but I promised I wouldn't show pictures of the sculplture until the exhibit opens. :)

First post! And an alligator.

2007-04-03T16:16:00.000-05:00

Hi there, my name is Sean, and I'm a professional LEGO builder... I meet a lot of people that think I have a pretty darn cool job (and I personally have to agree) so I thought it would be fun to share my wacky adventures with everyone in the bloggy world.

So, to start... This weekend, I helped build an 8-foot tall LEGO Alligator at FAO Schwarz in New York City, together with about 2 zillion very excited kids. (See 10 photos)

The highlight of the whole event came towards the end of the last day. A mom came by carrying a little girl, and put her down to watch us build. The girl was so small she didn't see the velvet ropes we were working behind... the second her mom put her down, she darted clear under them and sat straight down between me and one of the other builders. She then proceeded to grab LEGO bricks and add them to our LEGO alligator, completely oblivious to her mother beckoning "sweetie come back! you're not supposed to be over there!" She was so completely enamored with this LEGO sculpture that I couldn't even get her attention away... I eventually had to lift her up and carry her back to her mom. It was all incredibly cute.

Doing events like these make you feel like Santa Claus. :)