Edited by Staffan Ahrenberg, Sam Keller, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Anya Bondell. Introduction by Alexander S. C. Rower. Text by Ugo Mulas, Georges Mounin, Alfred Pacquement, et al.
Slip, pbk, 9.75 x 12.5 in. / 194 pgs / 143 color. | 10/20/2015 | In stock $80.00
Published by Cahiers d'Art. Edited by Alexander S.C. Rower, Staffan Ahrenberg. Text by Susan Braeuer Dam, Jed Perl, Alexander S.C. Rower.
This handsome volume celebrates Alexander Calder’s fascination with the game of chess. It comprises two parts: the first features scholarly and experimental texts exploring such topics as Calder’s relationship with Marcel Duchamp (who was famously obsessed with chess) and his involvement in the 1944 exhibition The Imagery of Chess at Julien Levy Gallery. Archival documentation, ephemera and reproductions of Calder’s chess sets—including photographs of each chess piece and related works on paper—are also featured. The second part of the book presents The Knightmares Portfolio, an approximation of an unrealized publication conceived in 1944 but never published. It comprises 46 chess drawings by Calder inscribed with titles, alternate titles and puns by Duchamp, Mary Reynolds and Calder.
Alexander Calder (1898–1976) settled in Paris in the late 1920s, and soon found himself at the center of the city’s artistic avant-garde. There, he developed his seminal Cirque Calder, a performance artwork comprising dozens of miniature handmade objects, and a group of standalone figurative works in wire. In 1930, Calder shifted towards abstraction with his invention of the mobile—an abstract sculpture made of independent parts that incorporate natural or mechanical movement. Calder would continue to explore the possibilities of this visual language for the rest of his career, though eventually shifting to monumental constructions and public works.
Published by The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Edited with text by Cara Manes. Text by Alexander Calder, Alexander S. C. Rower.
Alexander Calder’s work first appeared in the Museum of Modern Art’s galleries in 1930, in the exhibition Painting and Sculpture by Living Americans. Over the next decades the artist’s connection with the Museum would be deep, productive and mutually beneficial. Calder cultivated friendships and working relationships with notable figures, including Alfred H. Barr Jr., the Museum’s founding director, and James Johnson Sweeney, with whom he collaborated on his expansive retrospective exhibition in 1943. His work is imprinted on MoMA’s early history, not only for its material and conceptual innovation but also for its presence at significant moments, such as a mobile made to hang over the lobby’s grand staircase on the occasion of the new Goodwin and Stone building (Lobster Trap and Fish Tail, which hangs there to this day); an elaborate candelabra to adorn the tables at a celebratory anniversary event; and a sculpture to fly off a flagpole to advertise the landmark exhibition Cubism and Abstract Art.
Alexander Calder: Modern from the Start celebrates this extraordinarily fertile relationship between an institution and an artist who was both an important creative partner and, with his magnificent gift of 19 works in 1966, a major donor. Through MoMA, Calder came to be known as a pioneer of modern sculpture, and through Calder, MoMA came to understand itself as an American museum of modern art.
After studying engineering, Alexander Calder (1898–1976) moved to Paris in the late 1920s, where he found himself at the center of the city’s artistic avant-garde. There, he developed his Cirque Calder, a performance artwork comprising dozens of miniature handmade objects, and a group of standalone figurative works in wire. Turning toward abstraction in 1930, Calder invented the mobile—an abstract sculpture made of independent parts that incorporate natural or mechanical movement. He would continue to explore the possibilities of this visual language for the rest of his career, eventually shifting to monumental constructions and public works.
Published by Pace Publishing. Text by Alexander S. C. Rower, Susan Braeuer Dam, Arnauld Pierre, Noam M. Elcott, Stephanie Goto. Epilogue by Marc Glimcher.
With multiple essays by renowned scholars, artwork and installation images, and a suite of historic photographs of Alexander Calder’s (1898-1976) work taken by Marc Vaux in the 1930s, this catalog traces the breadth of Calder’s innovative practice, leading up to his conception of the mobile in 1931—an unprecedented form of kinetic sculpture that radically altered the trajectory of modern art.
Alexander Calder is one of the most acclaimed and influential sculptors of the 20th century. He is renowned for his invention of wire sculpture—coined by critics as “drawings in space”—and the mobile, a kinetic sculpture of suspended abstract elements whose actual movement creates ever-changing compositions. Also included is a lively series of drawings Calder made at the Bronx and Central Park zoos of animals in motion, which recall his wire sculptures of the same subjects.
Published by Hauser & Wirth Publishers. Text by Stephanie Goto, Andrew Berardini, James Jones.
Calder: Nonspace takes its title from a 1963 essay by American novelist James Jones, written after his encounter with a series of large-scale sculptures at Alexander Calder’s studio in Saché, France. In his essay, reprinted in this book, Jones astutely describes Calder’s deep understanding of architectural and natural environments, which enabled him to reorder a viewer’s perception of the world surrounding his sculptures.
This catalog explores this angle on Calder’s monumental vision by documenting an installation at Hauser & Wirth Los Angeles. It consists of more than 30 stabiles, mobiles and standing mobiles woven through a specially designed environment created by New York architectural designer Stephanie Goto (whose projects include the New York restaurant Piora and the apartment of chef Daniel Boulud), along with five large-scale works set outdoors.
Goto also contributes an essay that explores the transformation of a classical gallery into a unified experience, and an essay by Andrew Berardini looks at the moments in Calder’s work where space is transformed by art.
Published by Hauser & Wirth Publishers. Introduction by Alexander S.C. Rower, Peter Stevens. Text by Elizabeth M. Turner, Sarah Hamill.
Two of the most important American sculptors of the 20th century, Alexander Calder (1898–1976) and David Smith (1906–65) pushed sculptural practice in metal to new heights over the course of their careers. Bringing together pivotal sculpture of a historic moment in American art history, this monograph also features photographs from Italian Ugo Mulas, who met both sculptors in Spoleto in 1962 and documented them throughout his life. This publication is released on the occasion of an exhibition at Hauser & Wirth Zürich from June 10 to September 17, 2017.
Published by Hauser & Wirth Publishers. Text by Susan Braeuer Dam, Jessica Holmes.
Featuring over 90 works by Alexander Calder (1898–1976) including paintings, mobiles, stabiles, jewelry, domestic objects and furniture, plus six monumental outdoor sculptures, this catalog vividly illustrates a walkthrough of an ambitious exhibition in the British countryside in Somerset. Drawing a parallel with Calder’s longtime home and studio in Roxbury, Connecticut, it includes many previously unseen works.
An essay by Jessica Holmes focuses on the artist’s handcrafted domestic objects, offering insight into Calder’s life and inventive practice. Susan Braeuer Dam focuses on Calder’s move to Roxbury in 1933 and the shifts in his work, drawing upon themes of nature, process and monumentality, specifically as related to the 1934 sculptures surveyed here.
Published by Hatje Cantz. Text by Theodora Vischer, et al.
The American artist Alexander Calder (1898–1976) and Swiss artists Peter Fischli (born 1952) and David Weiss (1946–2012) have all sought and found quintessential ways of rendering a moment of fragile balance in art--a temporary state at once precarious and propitious. With Calder’s groundbreaking invention of the mobile in the early 1930s, and Fischli/Weiss’s collaborative creative work from 1979 onwards, these artists each lent the theme of fragile balance an iconic form of a very different kind.
At first glance, both positions could hardly be more different; later, however, they proved to be two sides of the same coin, the result of different perspectives on the same theme at different times. This elaborately designed, richly illustrated catalogue with accompanying essays provides insight into both oeuvres.
Published by Dominique Lévy. Text by Paul Goldberger, Jed Perl, Karl Shapiro, John Updike.
Multum in Parvo highlights the complex relationship between scale and size in the oeuvre of Alexander Calder (1898–1976) over a period of more than 30 years.
As its title--translating to “much in little”--implies, the volume features over 40 rare small-scale sculptures, ranging from the size of a thumb to 30 inches tall, all of which feature the same physical qualities as Calder’s largest mobiles in the most miniature of detail.
In addition to archival material, installation photography of the sculptures in the environment designed for them by architects Santiago and Gabriel Calatrava, and original architectural sketches, the book also includes commissioned essays by Jed Perl, art historian and author currently at work on the first full-length biography of Alexander Calder, and Paul Goldberger, Pulitzer Prize-winning architecture critic, as well as poems by Karl Shapiro and John Updike.
Published by Hatje Cantz. Text by George Baker, Arnauld Pierre.
Transparence: Calder Picabia is the first publication to explore the important aspect of transparency in the oeuvres of the two artists. Alexander Calder (1898–1976) and Francis Picabia (1879–1953) are both regarded as great innovators of 20th-century modernism. The volume creates a dialogue between selected works from the late 1920s to the post–World War II period. It casts light on the ensuing dialogue between Calder’s radically new creations—for instance, his works made of wire, the first to use transparency as a means of expression in sculpture—and Picabia’s abstracting contour pictures, his "transparencies" and paintings that make reference to these. Arnauld Pierre and George Baker, renowned experts on the work of both artists, examine the significance and impact of these correspondences in accompanying essays, while the works themselves are gorgeously reproduced in full bleeds.
Published by RM/Fundación Jumex Arte Contemporáneo. Text by Alexander S. C. Rower, José Esparza Chong Cuy, Juan García Ponce, José Revueltas.
Published to accompany the Museo Jumex exhibition of the same name, Discipline of the Dance focuses on the experiences of Alexander Calder (1898–1976) in Latin America—particularly his participation in the Cultural Olympiad, organized by artist Mathias Goeritz on the occasion of the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City—as a window onto his wide-ranging sculptural production. This well-illustrated volume includes nearly 100 works from the 1920s through the 1970s, including Calder’s signature wire mobiles and stabiles as well as paintings and jewelry, and documentation from the International Meeting of Sculptors held within the framework of the Olympiad. Particular attention is paid to the design process, fabrication and installation of “El sol rojo,” a sculpture by Calder that was part of the “Route of Friendship,” built to celebrate the Mexico 68 Games.
Published by Cahiers d'Art. Edited by Staffan Ahrenberg, Sam Keller, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Anya Bondell. Introduction by Alexander S. C. Rower. Text by Ugo Mulas, Georges Mounin, Alfred Pacquement, et al.
“Calder reached his artistic maturity in 1920s Paris at a time when the city was very much the center of burgeoning avant-garde experimentation. His early years in Paris marked the beginning of a lasting love for France, where he met many of his lifelong artist friends,” explains Alexander S. C. Rower, grandson of the artist and president of the Calder Foundation. “Calder’s time in France, and his continued legacy there, constitutes a natural and rich subject for study.”
The revue undertakes an in-depth exploration of the significant years Calder spent in France, beginning with his crucial years in Paris from 1926 to 1933, during which time the artist firmly established his imprint on the avant-garde scene. After the war, Calder spent significant periods of time in Paris in 1946, in Aix-en-Provence in 1953, and finally in Saché in the Loire Valley, where he would design his final monumental studio in 1963. The revue unveils the studios where Calder lived and worked through archival documentation, offering deeper insight into his work in each of these enigmatic places.
Calder in France also celebrates the legacy of Calder’s Saché studio over the past 25 years as a residency program for contemporary artists. Over the past quarter century, fifty artists have worked in Calder’s studio, including Martin Puryear, Tara Donovan, Ernesto Neto and Sarah Sze. The revue contains interviews with Tadashi Kawamata, Abraham Cruzvillegas and Rachel Harrison, a selection of images of past residents’ work, and a special portfolio of models for new sculptures by 2014 resident Monika Sosnowska. The revue also highlights Calder’s relationship with former Cahiers d'Art publisher Christian Zervos through the reproduction of several pivotal essays on Calder published during the artist’s lifetime.
Images of the artist’s work are published alongside seminal texts by Alexander S. C. Rower, and Susan Braeuer Dam, Director of Research and Publications at the Calder Foundation. The revue is also enriched with contributions by Alfred Pacquement, former Director of the Musée National d’Art moderne, Centre Pompidou and President of the Board of the Atelier Calder; Raphaël Bouvier, Curator at the Fondation Beyeler; Robert Rubin, architectural historian; and Hans-Ulrich Obrist, Co-Director of the Serpentine Gallery in London. Accompanying the texts are defining photographs of Calder and his work by Ugo Mulas and also Agnès Varda, with an interview by curator and art historian Joan Simon.
Published by Hatje Cantz. Edited by Delia Ciuha. Foreword by Sam Keller, Oliver Wick. Text by Oliver Wick.
Alexander Calder (1898–1976) famously transposed modernist visual abstraction into three-dimensional space, initially doing so in the context of European abstract artists such as Mondrian. In 1933, leaving Paris for his native United States, he settled in an old farmhouse in Roxbury, Connecticut, where the forms of nature became a new source of inspiration for his creativity. By the summer of 1934, Calder was producing his first outdoor sculptures. His monumental standing mobile "The Tree" (1966) exemplifies this new tension between abstraction and figuration. This volume, published for an exhibition at the Fondation Beyeler, tracks Calder’s evolution away from geometric abstraction and toward large-scale biomorphism via the tree motif. It includes maquettes that anticipate "The Tree" as well as a striking group of rarely seen sculptures from the 1930s to the 1950s.
Published by Cahiers d'Art/Calder Foundation. Edited by Alexander S.C. Rower. Contributions by Jed Perl, John T. Hill.
Photographer and graphic designer Herbert Matter, a close friend of Alexander Calder, had the privilege of photographing the artist’s sculptures at different stages of their realization and capturing Calder at work in his studios and in his Roxbury, Connecticut, home. Calder by Matter offers a new perspective on the sculptor’s life and work, presenting over 300 photographs of the artist and his family, many of which are previously unpublished.
Published by Editions Dilecta. Preface by Arnauld Pierre.
Animal Sketching was Alexander Calder's first book, published in New York in 1926 shortly before he left for France. It is a study of about ten animals and their movements, illustrated by numerous drawings, and with short commentaries by Calder on individual species and on problems of caricature, action and pose (or lack thereof). Animal Sketching also provides some insight into his ingenious sculptural work, foreshadowing as it does his famous Miniature Circus of 1927, in which these animals achieved full dimensionality. Following the Whitney Museum's 2008 exhibit on Calder's Paris years, Éditions Dilecta here provides a facsimile of a foundational publication by one of America's most beloved artists. This edition adds a postface by Arnauld Pierre, Calder expert and member of the Calder Foundation board. Beautifully and modestly designed, Animal Sketching is a giftworthy gem that will tickle adults and children alike.
PUBLISHER Editions Dilecta
BOOK FORMAT Hardcover, 6.25 x 9 in. / 104 pgs / 140 bw.
PUBLISHING STATUS Pub Date 10/31/2009 Out of stock indefinitely
DISTRIBUTION D.A.P. Exclusive Catalog: FALL 2009 p. 86
PRODUCT DETAILS ISBN 9782916275536TRADE List Price: $45.00 CDN $60.00
Published by Jonathan O'Hara Gallery. Foreword by Jonathan O'Hara. Preface by Jessica Holmes.
Dinner bells, chess sets, ashtrays, candelabra, key rings, door latches, forks, spoons, tie racks, toys and long, duck-like cigarette holders are just some of the hand-made domestic objects that the important and prolific American sculptor Alexander Calder (1898-1976) made out of humble, recycled materials for his homes and his loved ones over the course of his long career. This delightful volume features 52 diverse, often anthropomorphic, but always functional objects that represent this limited and rarely seen facet of Calder's oeuvre. It is the first to focus on Calder's purely utilitarian art since 1989. Jessica Holmes writes in her introduction, "Combining a profound comprehension of mechanics with an aesthetic sensibility, Calder produced a household full of practical items that are mundane in name only--ashtray, folding table, toaster--names that belie a fantastic integration of function and form."
PUBLISHER Jonathan O'Hara Gallery
BOOK FORMAT Hardback, 9.25 x 9 in. / 80 pgs / 102 color / 23 bw.
PUBLISHING STATUS Pub Date 7/1/2008 Out of print
DISTRIBUTION D.A.P. Exclusive Catalog: FALL 2008 p. 108
PRODUCT DETAILS ISBN 9780974075167TRADE List Price: $30.00 CDN $35.00
Published by Charta. Artwork by Alexander Calder. Edited by Giovanni Carandente.
This fascinating book traces the construction and installation of Alexander Calder's monumental "Teodelapio," from his first ideas for large-scale sculptures in the 1930s up to the difficulties attending the construction of the final sculpture.
PUBLISHER Charta
BOOK FORMAT Paperback, 8.25 x 10.6 in. / 104 pgs / 10 color / 34 bw / 57 duotone.
PUBLISHING STATUS Pub Date 9/2/1996 No longer our product
DISTRIBUTION D.A.P. Exclusive Catalog: FALL 1996
PRODUCT DETAILS ISBN 9788881580750TRADE List Price: $29.95 CDN $35.00