Alexander Calder

Barrel shaped "Sandy" Calder with his white hair set off against a bright red flannel shirt and blue jeans, grunted directions in a good humored way, as a crew of students festooned the large gallery in Robinson Hall with his unusual sculpture. When everything was finally in place, Calder thanked his helpers individually and then disappeared with friends, leaving a small group still gaping at the wonderland before their eyes.

At his first exhibition in Paris in 1932, Calder asked artist friend Marcel Duchamp what he should call the new moving metal sculpture. Duchamp replied, "Mobiles." In the twenty three years since, "Mobiles" have all but replaced chandeliers, and their originator has become the first native American sculptor to win international recognition.

Calder's often copied but rarely equalled constructions have been likened to carefully balanced machinery. His engineering background is certainly evident in the precision he gives to the execution of his work and the mathematical balance applied to composition. Furthermore, the materials he uses, wire and sheet steel, are products of a technologically advanced culture. However, for the most part these materials are welded into flowing metal metaphors. In contrast to painter Ferdinand Leger or the constructivist sculptors who have also integrated science and aesthetics, Calder is not primarily concerned with industrial or mechanical shapes. His design, as the titles "Spider" and "Big Worm--Little Worm" suggest, stems from nature. Beyond direct observation of natural phenomena the biological shapes of Arp and especially Miro have influenced him.

Motion expressed by actual movement, is the central theme of Calder's sculpture. As he said in 1951: "I think that . . . the underlying sense of form in my work has been the system of the Universe . . . What I mean is that the idea of detached bodies floating in space of different sizes and densities, perhaps of different colors and temperatures . . . some at rest, while others move in peculiar manners seems to me the ideal source of form. I would have them deployed some nearer together and some at immense distances and great disparity among all the qualities of these objects and their motions as well."

It has been suggested, that the idea of animating sculpture could only have occurred to an artist living in a time when extraordinary problems of fast motion have been solved through the production of machines that carry men rapidly over land, water and air. Representation of birds and fish has likewise been influenced by a greater understanding of motion in these media, in that certain forms are now automatically identified as expressive of fast motion.

If Calder's mobiles convey a feeling of insecurity by emphasizing the instability of the ground, they make one aware at the same time that this can be overcome by developing man's natural sense of balance. Shapes which appear to float in space are actually highly controlled in the artist's universe.

Beside Mobiles the exhibit at the Graduate School of Design includes a number of "Stabiles," the name John Arp gave Calder's stationary sculpture. "Big Ear" is an example of how bulky these pieces can get and is an interesting contrast to the airiness of the mobiles. The wire "Stabiles" have always been noted for their humor, and "Reclining Nude" and "Polo Rider" are no exception.

The best advice for enjoying Calder's whimsically titled sculpture was given by the artist himself: "That others grasp what I have in mind seems unessential, at least as long as they have something else in theirs."