However, eventually they evolved to move due to natural forces. The sculptures were designed in such a way that they would catch the air currents in a room or the breeze outside, a revolutionary concept in the world of art. This came after one of his first solo exhibitions in in which Calder showcased his wire sculptures.
The term was also apt for Calder as he would carry bits of wire with him and fashion images of what he saw in the streets. Famously, he enjoyed creating wire portraits of people he met — one of his most well known was of the actress, Kiki, in Coming from an artistic family, it is not hard to see how Calder ended up being such a pillar of the art world, although it was not his parents who pushed him into this career.
His father, also called Alexander Calder, was a sculptor himself, so he knew the hardships that came with being an artist. From an early age Calder showed an interest in sculpture and using his hands to mold the world around him. At the age of 11, his sister bought him a pair of pliers for Christmas. He used these to make two little brass sculptures for his mother and father, one of a duck and another of a dog.
Metal went on to be his principal medium. His work uses bits of old wire and wood, showcasing how beauty can be created out of unwanted scraps. Calder studied mechanical engineering at Stevens Institute of Technology, graduating in However, whilst working on a ship in , it was on seeing the red sun off the shore of Guatemala that he was reminded of his artistic upbringing.
He turned his back on this lifestyle, initially moving to New York where he worked as an artist for several newspapers until he eventually moved to the art hub, Paris, in During his time in Paris he began sketching people in the streets and making little wire figurines in his hotel room.
One of the first characters he made was Josephine Baker who was renowned across the globe for her Charleston dancing. It was this movement and energy that Calder tried to capture in his models of her. Although his work never specifically relied on the knowledge he gained during his studies, it seems undeniable that his skills influenced his perfectly assembled sculptures. The first is to make it more alive. The second is always to bear in mind the balance of it.
Calder sought to represent and capture movement in all his works throughout his lifetime. This fascination started whilst living in New York. For two weeks he visited the circus, a melting pot for the whole of society.
Here he drew and painted the spectacles that he saw, trying to capture the animation of the environment. A somewhat heavy man who was light on his feet, he had hazel eyes, a head of unruly hair and a big open face.
He was funny and easygoing and appealing. During the days they played deck tennis and watched the flying fish from the bow. By the time they disembarked in New York, Sandy and Louisa were a couple. She was drawn to his energy, his intensity and his humor. And he was falling in love with her cool, contemplative spirit. Louisa James, as Calder soon realized, came from a family as artistically and intellectually distinguished as any in America.
An adventurous upbringing was something that Sandy and Louisa had in common. Both families had experienced life on the West Coast as well as the East Coast.
That winter, Calder had exhibitions in New York and in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and mounted a number of performances of the Cirque Calder , but what mattered most during the eight months Sandy spent in the United States was his intensifying affair with Louisa. She crossed the Atlantic again in July. She took a bicycle tour of Ireland with a friend, Helen Coolidge.
And then, after a brief stay in London, she hotfooted it over to Paris—and to Sandy Calder. However unconventional Louisa might have been, when confronting the question of marriage she was also very much a young woman from a fine Boston family, and aware of all the considerations that came with her place in the world. And yet she already sensed in him the powers of a man who would become one of the most extraordinary artists of the century.
He has ideals, ambition, and plenty of common sense, with great ability. He has tremendous originality, imagination and humour which appeal to me very much and which make life colorful and worthwhile. In October Calder gave a performance of his circus in Paris that was attended by some of the most demanding of the Parisian avant-garde, including the architect Le Corbusier and the painter Piet Mondrian.
Mondrian was two years shy of 60 when Calder met him. His home—approached through a little courtyard off the boulevard Montparnasse—was unlike anything Calder had ever seen.
The apartment had a curious setup, with the bedroom in one structure and the studio, irregularly shaped, a few steps up in what was a different but conjoined building. The studio was a five-sided room, with windows on two sides. The odd shape was part of its magic, the violation of the rectangular shape one would ordinarily have expected creating surprising spatial and visual dislocations. It was incredible. Standing in that astonishing studio, Calder at last understood where the increasing simplicity of his own wire sculpture had been leading him.
It was much more than an understanding. It was a feeling. Calder could now see himself working in the abstract. Though many other artists have since created works based on his principles, even now, decades later, Calder is still the undisputed master of this form of sculpture.
Painted and unpainted sheet aluminum, iron wire, and copper rivets - Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice, Italy. Counterpoint to his mobiles, Calder created many stabiles, composed of intersecting shaped planes of bolted sheet metal, often painted a single color.
Devil Fish was the first larger-scale stabile Calder made. By forming combinations of curved biomorphic shapes, Calder creates a swirling sense of motion, even in a static sculpture such as this. Later stabiles combined both organic and geometric forms. During his later years Calder produced many monumental stabiles and mobiles as public works for sites worldwide.
Man was commissioned for Montreal's Expo ' At 65 feet tall, its one of Calder's largest sculptures. Works such as Man contributed to the proliferation of public art during the second half of the 20 th century. Such grand stabiles are dynamic works, with their arches, points, and flowing forms reaching out in multiple directions.
Content compiled and written by Rachel Gershman. Edited and published by The Art Story Contributors. The Art Story. Ways to support us. Movements and Styles: Surrealism. What I mean is that the idea of detached bodies floating in space, of different sizes and densities, perhaps of different colors and temperatures, and surrounded and interlarded with wisps of gaseous condition, and some at rest, while others move in peculiar manners, seems to me the ideal source of form.
Summary of Alexander Calder American artist Alexander Calder redefined sculpture by introducing the element of movement, first through performances of his mechanical Calder's Circus and later with motorized works, and, finally, with hanging works called "mobiles. Read full biography. Read artistic legacy. Artwork Images.
Influences on Artist. Hans Arp. Pablo Picasso. Piet Mondrian. Marcel Duchamp.
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