The Brick Testament
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The Brick Testament is a project created by Brendan Powell Smith in which Bible stories are illustrated in parody using still photographs of dioramas constructed entirely out of Lego bricks. The project began as a website in October 2001 that featured six stories from the book of Genesis.[citation needed] There is also a Brick Testament book series.[1]
The project uses Lego as an art medium. Smith's assertion is that the parody adheres to the scripture of the Christian Bible.[2] All stories are retold using passages from the Bible, with chapter and verse cited. Smith has updated most of the stories with his own wording which is based on a number of public domain Bible translations.[3] Smith introduces his own commentary in the illustrations, where characters are sometimes portrayed as saying or thinking words that are not quotes from even Smith's own wording of the Bible. Such text is displayed in gray instead of the usual black.
The website and book series have been released for use, and apparently used by both churches and anti-religious groups.[4][5]
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[edit] Parody Commentary
Smith's own commentary appears in illustrations and is displayed in gray text, and also as original titles for the stories themselves. For example, Smith presents the story titled, "Stephen Gets Stoned" which he bases on the New Testament book, the Acts of the Apostles, chapters 6-7. The scripture verse is cited directly beneath the illustration and commentary:
- Scripture: Acts 6:10 But they were unable to stand against the wisdom and spirit with which Stephen spoke.
- Illustration and commentary: A man is depicted holding a scroll in front of a crowd with a speech balloon saying: If you look at a few phrases here and there and completely ignore their original context, they totally predict Jesus! [6]
[edit] Lego Techniques
The dioramas seen in The Brick Testament are created from Smith's personal Lego collection. The pieces come from hundreds of Lego sets dating from the 1960s to the present.
In the few instances where alterations are made to Lego elements, they are generally simple changes made with a hobby knife or permanent ink marker. An example alteration is God's hair: Smith made God's white hair by carving a white helmet piece, presumably because he could not locate the rare male white hair piece. The only completely non-Lego part of Smith's scenes is the background sky.[7]
All of Smith's images are digital. Smith photographed early scenes with a Nikon Coolpix 950. He currently uses a Nikon Coolpix 4500. After photographing the scenes, he adds speech balloons and sometimes makes alterations using image editing programs such as Paint Shop Pro or Adobe Photoshop.[citation needed]
[edit] Media
[edit] Website
The Brick Testament website[8] began in October 2001. It originally featured six stories from the book of Genesis. The site now contains nearly 200 illustrated stories from both the Old and New Testaments.[citation needed] It had an Alexa traffic rank of 53,191 in April 2007.[citation needed] Each story is tagged if it contains nudity, sexual content, violence and/or cursing.[citation needed]
[edit] Books
Several hardcover Brick Testament books have been published, The Brick Testament: Stories from the Book of Genesis,[9] [10] The Brick Testament: The Story of Christmas,[11] [12] and The Brick Testament: The Ten Commandments.[13]
[edit] Notes and references
- ^ Brick Testament on Amazon.com
- ^ Brick Testament FAQ
- ^ Smith has stated the rationale for updated wording of TBT is to avoid copyright issues.
- ^ map showing a sampling of 200 churches and religious groups that sought and received permission to use Brick Testament illustrations between August 2006 and March 2007
- ^ Steve Wells of Skeptic's Annotated Bible uses pictures from The Brick Testament as criticism of Bible
- ^ Excerpt from Stephen Gets Stoned
- ^ Brick Testament FAQ
- ^ The Brick Testament website
- ^ 2003, Quirk Books, ISBN 1-931686-45-9
- ^ Das 1. Buch L. (German version, ISBN 3-7254-1336-3), レゴで遊ぶ天地創造ものがたり (Japanese version, ISBN 4-576-04235-1), 레고로 만나는 창세기: 하나님 처음 지으신 세상 (Korean version, ISBN 89-91290-10-8)
- ^ 2004, Quirk Books, ISBN 1-59474-012-7
- ^ 레고로 만나는 예수 탄생: 크리스마스 이야기 (Korean version, ISBN 89-91290-11-6)
- ^ 2005, Quirk Books, ISBN 1-59474-044-5
[edit] External links
[edit] General
[edit] News articles
- Challender, Mary (2005-03-24). "Lego toys convert to Bible stories". Des Moines Register. http://www.thebricktestament.com/press/des_moines_register_05_03_24.html.
- Rubin, Daniel (11 December 2003). ""In the beginning" was a snap.". Philadelphia Inquirer. http://www.thebricktestament.com/press/philadelphia_inquirer_03_12_11.html.
- Vo, Kim (2003-11-22). "The Bible, brick by brick: Genesis stories illustrated in Legos". San Jose Mercury News. http://www.thebricktestament.com/press/san_jose_mercury_news_03_11_22.html.
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