The School of Athens

[paupadros]

The School of Athens (Scuola di Atene) is one of the best pieces of art in the history of humanity, here's the Lego version:

The School of Athens was completed in 1511 and is not only considered Raffaello Sanzio's finest work, but also the work that sums up the spirit of the Renaissance. My brother has struggling to finish this project properly and almost set it aside and gave up. I took it over and finished it in a smaller scale.

Why "The School of Athens"?

With so many sets based on movie and on pop culture, we thought it was only right to give art in the traditional sense a chance at becoming an official product. For us, this painting represents humanity, explicitly and implicitly. Just at first galnce, some aspects of human knowledge are visible: architecture, painting, sculpture, philosophy, anatomy, cosmology, but also things inherent to the work: manual rendering of materials and surfaces, colour theory or the perspectives that became so common around then. But the fun of it are the layers of extra meaning it bears. The figures stand in certain angles, perpetually braking the symmetry, linking geometry to the real world. Raphael crafted the characters so they are immensely expressive and vital; they really do feel alive, something I feel my brother has also achieved, they interact, they discuss, they disagree, they agree, they are typically human: they cooperate with one another, something the ancients can teach us. I believe this is not a mere fresco, it is a piece of art that can teach us.

Who is who?

Represented here are some of the most important philosophers, mathematicians and thinkers of ancient Greece, Rome and even muslim Spain. Some of the statues are pagan gods and some of the figures have the faces of eminent Renaissance figures, with Heraclitus having Michelangelo's face, Euclid having Bramante's face and Apelles having the painter's face, all in all, a nice mix, something that also applies to today's multicultural cityscapes.

Video:

 

Fun facts about the Lego model:

• Originally the plan was to give the 1x1 brick with 4 studs on the sides to the women in the painting and the Erling brick to the men, but my brother ended up giving the 1x1 brick with 4 studs on the sides to male figures too, as the Erling brick didn't allow for side hair.
• The compass Euclid uses are some cherries.
• The only Olive Green pieces in the whole model are for Socrates, the originator of what today we understand as "philosophy" (the philosophers before him are today known as "pre-Socratics".
• The robes next to Diogenes are regular Lavander, nor Medium Lavander like the rest of the robes in the rest of the model.
• Only women wear Aqua garbs.

Edited March 11, 2022 by paupadros

[Robert8]

Whoa what an interestin project. Will support for sure

Maybe LEGO can add 1x1 printed tiles with printed faces for the characters. That a style of figure I've never seen

Love how the recolored barbed wire piece is used here 

 

Thanks for sharing!

[paupadros]

30 minutes ago, Robert8 said:

Whoa what an interestin project. Will support for sure

Maybe LEGO can add 1x1 printed tiles with printed faces for the characters. That a style of figure I've never seen

Love how the recolored barbed wire piece is used here 

 

Thanks for sharing!

So glad you like it. I like the abstraction my brother did for the faces; a bit like Lego Architecure's "Statue of Liberty", plus I think that printed designs on tiles would be creepier!  Yeah, the usage of the barbed wire piece is rather genius. It think it was around Februrary (this project was begun last November...) that my brother came back a day from university home and went "have you seen the new piece in the Welcome to Apocalypseburg set? I was sort of: what new piece? He said "the barbed wire piece". I knew it was a reissue, but nonetheless, thanks to that set he discovered and I was reminded of it. I think it works great here. Plus @Scrubs' model for Mecabricks is just beautifully detailed. Also about a month ago, when you released Series O, I was super jealous of your new lyre piece. I thought: "Damn, that piece in tan would be perfect for Apollo instead of that sextant!". Thanks for your support!

Edited July 22, 2019 by paupadros

[Merlict]

Absolutely excellent, not sure why this isn't getting more attention. 

I do think more of the faces should be 'capped' with just a tan 1x1 tile or that very small 'D' shaped tile, the empty hole look is a bit distracting. 

[Kaanere]

Great creation! But the Ideas link isn't working for me.

[paupadros]

On 8/25/2019 at 7:26 AM, Merlict said:

Absolutely excellent, not sure why this isn't getting more attention. 

I do think more of the faces should be 'capped' with just a tan 1x1 tile or that very small 'D' shaped tile, the empty hole look is a bit distracting. 

Thanks! We tried various designs for the faces. To be honest all the different tiles as faces looked worse. The holes were the only solution that gave soul to the characters, all the other solutions made them seem flat-faced or smug. Thanks anyway! 

On 8/25/2019 at 6:35 PM, Kaanere said:

Great creation! But the Ideas link isn't working for me.

Yeah, they took down the model for it containing religious content. It's something we feared but rolled on with anyway. That said, we might try to repost it after sending a mail to the Ideas team.

[koalayummies]

Fantastic build. Its very visually pleasing. I especially like the build style for the people, very unique. Most excellent work!

[The Brick Boss]

You've done a bang up job on this one! I'm loving the detail. 

[Actionfigure]

Very nice! I especially like that it´s not done with minifigures! You put effort in every character.

[paupadros]

Whoa! Sorry guys, I had missed this new batch of comments.

On 5/12/2020 at 2:59 PM, DonLara said:

Wow, it looks great! It looks more like an antique castle than the school, p.s. Sculptures are really wonderful) I hate schools; I've always tried to find a way to skip lessons or use artscolumbia, free essay samples to make the study process easier. I think that the information on this site is very useful, and I should go and by the new LEGO.

I somewhat agree with the first statement. In order to keep it somewhat in reasonable scale and piece count, we had to remove a chunk of the architecture Raphael painted and it results in it losing a bit of its grandeur and charm. As for skipping school... not my thing. I actually enjoy it a lot.

On 5/25/2020 at 11:40 AM, finistratbob said:

GOOD POST

Thanks!

On 5/12/2020 at 6:50 PM, koalayummies said:

Fantastic build. Its very visually pleasing. I especially like the build style for the people, very unique. Most excellent work!

On 5/12/2020 at 7:34 PM, Brandon Pea said:

You've done a bang up job on this one! I'm loving the detail. 

On 5/17/2020 at 4:51 PM, Actionfigure said:

Very nice! I especially like that it´s not done with minifigures! You put effort in every character.

Thanks you! It was quite daring to do it completely without minifigures. Especially at the beginning, finding a style that worked well was quite hard, but, once we found it, it's a style that's very fun to design. There's some pieces that were used in various figures to achieve some of the poses: the sausage piece, a harpoon piece come to mind. Not using minifigures definitely has the upside of not having to design prints, of being able to skew perspective and of fitting all the characters in the needed space (minifigures are notoriously too wide in proportions).