One of the most important exhibitions ever dedicated to Alexander Calder, «Calder. Rêver en Équilibre» has been conceived in close collaboration with the Calder Foundation, its principal lender. The display also features loans from international institutions and leading private collectors, bringing together nearly 300 works: stabiles and mobiles – to use the Calderian terminology for static and kinetic abstractions – as well as wire portraits, carved wooden figures, paintings, drawings, and even jewelry, designed as unique sculptures.
Apple Monster, 1938. Wood, wire, and paint, 66″ x 55 1/2″ x 32 1/2″. Calder Foundation, New York; Gift of Alexander S. C. Rower in memory of Mary Calder Rower, 2015. Photograph by Tom Powel Imaging © Calder Foundation, New York.
Throughout the chronological journey spanning more than 3,000 m2, the exhibition at Fondation Louis Vuitton will highlight Calder’s fundamental artistic concerns: movement above all, but also light, reflection, humble materials, sound, the ephemeral, gravity, performance, and the interplay of positive and negative space.
Devil Fish, 1937. Sheet metal, bolts, and paint. 68″ x 64″ x 47″. Photograph by David Heald © Calder Foundation, New York.
The anniversary exhibition is enriched by contributions from Calder’s contemporaries. Works by the artist’s friends Jean Arp, Barbara Hepworth, Jean Hélion, and Piet Mondrian, as well as Paul Klee and Pablo Picasso, will situate Calder’s radical inventiveness within the avant- garde movement. 34 photographs taken by some of the most important photographers of the 20th century – Henri Cartier-Bresson, André Kertész, Gordon Parks, Man Ray, Irving Penn, and Agnès Varda, among others – will show an artist walking a tightrope between art and life. «Calder. Rêver en Équilibre» will also feature focused presentations dedicated to key bodies of Calder’s work, including his beloved Constellation series and his dynamic jewelry.
Calder with Mobile (1941) in his Roxbury studio, 1941. Photograph by Herbert Matter © Calder Foundation, New York.
In line with previous monographic exhibitions dedicated to major 20th and 21st century figures – such as Jean-Michel Basquiat, Joan Mitchell, Charlotte Perriand, Mark Rothko, David Hockney, Gerhard Richter – the Fondation Louis Vuitton is dedicating all of its exhibition spaces, and for the first time its adjoining lawn, to Calder’s work. In doing so, the exhibition initiates a dialogue between Calder’s volumes, planes and movements and those of Frank Gehry’s architecture.
Fondation Louis Vuitton in Paris – from April 15th to August 18th – Calder. Rêver En Equilibre.
LoL, Sandra
La Grande vitesse (1:5 intermediate maquette). 1969. Sheet metal, bolts, and paint, 102″ x 135″ x 93″ (259.1 x 342.9 x 236.2 cm).
The Brass Family. 1929. Brass wire and painted wood. Overall: 67 × 41 1/8 × 8 7/8in. (170.2 × 104.5 × 22.5 cm). Gift of the artist. Inv. N.: 69.255 – Artwork Location: Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, USA – Permission for usage must be provided in writing from Scala.
Harps and Heart, c. 1937. Brass wire, loop: 40″; element: 6 1/4″ x 4″. Photograph by Maria Robledo © Calder Foundation, New York.
Photos: © Louis Vuitton
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