Public eye | Xander Gottfried, 12

Photo: Erica Gannett

Interesting name.
It’s really Alexander, but I like Xander better.

Yeah, it’s spacey. What are your plans for the summer?
Lots of camps! I’m doing a GreenApple LEGO and robotics camp.

You’re big into LEGOs?
Yeah, we have a lot of them at the house, like Batman, and Castle, which is, like, knights and dragons and stuff.

What goes on at LEGO camp?
You, like, build robots out of LEGOs and then have them fight each other. There’s also a stop-motion workshop where you build sets and characters, then move them a little and take a picture until it’s a movie.

Have you ever shot a movie before?
At school. It was a Star Wars–themed movie for our human body presentation.

Like a sci-fi adventure?
Sort of. It was called Sperm Wars. We had Luke Skywalker as a sperm swimming along and he reached the egg and then a baby was formed. Then we had Darth Vader—he was a macrophage, which is a thing that eats sperm. So they fought a lot along the way.

How did your teacher react?
He liked it! He thought it was funny.

Is that how you learned how babies are made?
Mostly I learned how to edit a movie, which is something I hadn’t done before.

Anything else on your summer agenda?
I’m also doing a superhero drawing camp at Lillstreet Art Center. We draw comics and superheroes and stuff, and they show us how to do shadowing on faces and things.

Who’s your favorite caped crusader to draw?
I like Batman.

Why does the Dark Knight appeal to you most?
It’s because he could be real, you know? He doesn’t have a superpower, so he could actually exist.

Sounds like an epic summer.
Yeah, I like being off of school, but sometimes I kind of miss it.