Untitled 1949: A Revolutionary Sculpture by Alexander Calder
“Calder’s work offers extraordinary possibilities for the integration of sculpture in the architecture of our t.mes … Visualizing the work being touched by a breeze, occupying the clear space with its new rhythms, one understands not only the importance of Calder’s contributions to architecture, but especially to that architecture of the sun and open spaces, which occurs in Brazil.”
At once organically graceful, dramatically scaled, and precisely executed, Alexander Calder’s Untitled from 1949 is a symphonic archetype of the groundbreaking marriage between form and movement that constitutes the singular hallmark of its creator’s legacy. Comprised of fifteen individually shaped sheet.mes tal elements that arc through space in seamless unison, the present work broadcasts the very quintessence of Calder’s revolutionary approach to sculpture. Spanning more than ten by fourteen feet, yet balletically floating with apparent weightlessness, and characterized by its single red element amidst an all-black framework, Untitled is not only an immense technical achievement but also a remarkably exquisite aesthetic triumph.
Executed in 1949, the present work is further distinguished as the spectacular result of a particularly significant moment in the artist’s career, imbuing it with additional import and historical significance. Following a chance meeting with renowned Brazilian architect Henrique Mindlin in 1944, Calder traveled to Rio de Janeiro in 1948 and embarked on a series of projects and collaborations for the Brazilian cultural elite. The present work, originally conceived as the centerpiece for the private home Mindlin designed for patron George Hime, is wholly demonstrative of the profound influence that Calder’s visit to Rio had on his output. A Modernist architectural feat, the Hime residence won first prize in the private housing competition at the first São Paulo Biennial in 1951, and demand for Calder’s work in Brazil reached dizzying new heights. Untitled thus stands not only as a stunning exemplar of Calder’s distinctive aesthetic but also as an indelible vestige of a period of profound creative flourishing and insatiable inspiration.
Beautifully reflecting the dialogue that Modernist architecture has with open space and sunlight, the physical components of Untitled comprise the absolute essentials of Calder’s artistic project. Its nimble movement is heightened by the aerodynamic apertures in several of the black elements; in the 1940s, Calder began piercing certain components of his mobiles in an effort both to heighten their transparency and surface animation and, to a more technical end, to adjust the physical and visual weight of the work as a whole. As he explained, “When I cut out my plates I have two things in mind. I want them to be more alive, and I think about balance. Which explains the holes in the plates. The most important thing is that the mobile be able to catch the air. It has to be able to move.” (Alexander Calder in 1959, cited in: XXE siècle, Homage à Calder, Paris 1972, p. 98) In the present work, the two pierced elements are suspended in perfect counterbalance to each other; at the top, one large pierced plate rotates above the viewer, parallel to the ground, while near the bottom, a smaller perforated element glides perpendicularly across. With its impressively large scale and abstract, shifting forms, Untitled, as with the greatest of Calder’s mobiles, continuously redefines the surrounding space as it moves, casting an endless pattern of shadows in their wake. “Just as one can compose colors, or forms,” the artist declared in 1933, “so one can compose motions.” (Alexander Calder cited in: Exh. Cat., London, Tate Modern, Alexander Calder: Performing Sculpture, 2015, p. 24)
Credited with revolutionizing contemporary sculpture, Calder reimagined the role and function of the medium, releasing it from a history of relative stasis and heralding a new era of artistic freedom and invention. Calder was born into a family of artists who supported his exploration from an early age. An artist since childhood, he was deeply attuned to the unseen forces of nature, seeking new ways to explore and activate these precepts through art. In 1923, Calder enrolled in the Art Students League in New York to study painting; just three years later, his inherent creative drive and flair for the arts impelled him to move to Paris, where he would attract the attention of contemporaries such as Joan Miró, Man Ray, Fernand Léger, Jean Arp, Marcel Duchamp, and Piet Mondrian. Indeed, the impetus behind Calder’s move to abstraction occurred in a now legendary visit to Piet Mondrian’s studio in 1930, where the sight of rectangles of colored paper, arranged on the wall, for compositional experimentation, compelled Calder to suggest that they “oscillate.” In an interview in 1932, Calder revealed his excit.mes nt at the extraordinary new creative world he was discovering: “Why must art be static?... You look at an abstraction, sculptured or painted, an intensely exciting arrangement of planes, spheres, nuclei, entirely without.mes aning. It would be perfect, but it is always still. The next step in sculpture is motion.” (Alexander Calder quoted in Howard Greenfield, The Essential Alexander Calder, New York, 2003, p. 67)
Instantly recognizable across the globe, Calder’s celebrated mobiles represent the very paradigm of his genius, establishing him as one of the most important sculptors of the Twentieth Century. Works such as Untitled exist today as a test.mes nt not only to Calder’s extraordinary creative vision, but also to his dexterity in exploiting the aerodynamics of balance and harmony into a climactic culmination of color, form and motion. Ultimately, this serene work perfectly epitomizes the emotions and attitudes suggested in Calder’s own conclusion on the art form he pioneered: "The aesthetic value of these objects cannot be arrived at by reasoning. Familiarization is necessary.” (The artist cited in Exh. Cat., Pittsfield, Berkshire Museum, Modern Painting and Sculpture: Alexander Calder, George L.K. Morris, Calvert Coggeshall, Alma de Gersdorff Morgan, 1933)
