Audio by Laura Green
Maker: Alexander Calder (1898 – 1976)
Culture: American
Title: Mobile
Date Made: 1934
Type: Sculpture
Materials: Nickel-plated wood, wire, and steel
Measurements: 42.5 x 12 in.
Transcript:
I love this work because it’s such a simple concept that you would have sculptures that responded to the air and to touch, and that moved on their own, and were weighted in these different ways with different materials, but Calder was the first one to ever think of it. He created something that no one had ever thought of before. In this piece, these metal shapes are hanging from wire, and the whole structure is very delicate, but the shapes at the bottom have this weight, and they can move on their own as air moves around it. But the thing is that you can’t blow on them, you can’t touch them, and the environment of the museum is so controlled that there aren’t that many elements that end up realistically moving it. So its, kind of, whole purpose as an artwork is almost taken away. It’s only in our imagination of how it would change if we were to touch it. And something that I also find amazing about this is that his works were named mobiles, and then baby mobiles were invented because of that. He didn’t name them after this baby toy, toys were created because of his art. And that really speaks to the way that art can transcend into our culture, that it can become a part of our everyday and what we see all around us.