Alexander Calder

Alexander Calder (United States, 1898–1976). Born in Lawnton, Pennsylvania, he came from a family of artists and trained as a mechanical engineer at the Stevens Institute of Technology before studying at the Art Students League of New York. He worked in sculpture, drawing, painting, printmaking, jewelry, textiles, household objects, and set design.

After moving to Paris in 1926, he developed a style based on movement, balance, and lightness. She created “mobiles”—suspended sculptures that move through air currents or motors—and “stables”—fixed structures that can reach monumental scale. The incorporation of actual movement and her experimentation with different disciplines characterized her work.

The Museum of Modern Art in New York presented a retrospective of his work in 1943, curated by James Johnson Sweeney and Marcel Duchamp. In 1964–1965, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum organized another retrospective that traveled to Paris, Milwaukee, and Washington. He represented the United States at the 1952 Venice Biennale, where he won the Grand Prize for Sculpture, and received the French Legion of Honor and, posthumously, the U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom. His work is included in collections such as those of the Museum of Modern Art, the Tate, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, and the Whitney Museum of American Art.