Alexander Calder at the Museum of Contemporary Art

Sunday, 29 July 2007 00:04

Chicago, IL - Alexander Calder is the subject of a small exhibition each year at the MCA to provide an opportunity to look at how the seminal artist's ideas developed throughout his fifty-year career. These works from 1927 to 1968, mostly from The Ruth and Leonard Horwich Family Loan, include examples of Calder's mobiles, stabiles, drawings, and paintings. Calder combined colorful shapes abstracted from nature -- snowflakes, birds, and animals -- with an interest in mechanics to create whimsical, hanging mobiles that move with air currents. On exhibition July 28, 2007 - April 2008.

His explorations of both geometric and organic shapes have distinguished him as an innovator of art that responds to its physical environment. Calder changed his focus from drawing to painting to eventually creating stabiles, mobiles, and large-scale sculptures. Upon his return to the United States, Calder's work turned towards natural forms that he simplified into dynamic, often whimsical creatures. This exhibition is organized by Pamela Alper Associate Curator Julie Rodrigues Widholm.

About the MCA

One of the nation's largest facilities devoted to the art of our time, the Museum of Contemporary Art (MCA) offers exhibitions of the most thought-provoking art created since 1945. The MCA documents contemporary visual culture through painting, sculpture, photography, video and film, and performance. Located in the heart of downtown Chicago, the MCA boasts a gift store, bookstore, restaurant, 300-seat theater, and a terraced sculpture garden with a great view of Lake Michigan. Visit : www.mcachicago.org/