Art class 3rd cycle presentation

1. Alexander Calder
United States of America, 1898 – 1976

2. Was he a mechanic?
Or an inventor…
a sculptor…
a painter…
an engineer...
What did he do?

3. Calder’s family
▪ Alexander Calder was
born in Philadephia (USA)
into a family of artists.
▪ His father and his
grandfather were both
sculptors.
▪ His mother was a
professional portrait
painter.

4. Can you find the United States in a map?

5. Calder’s youth
▪ When he was 8, he had his
first set of tools.
▪ He liked creating toys and
things to play with, specially
things with movement.
▪ He studied Mechanical
Engineering and Art.
▪ Some people called him the
mechanical artist. Dog, 1909 Duck, 1909

6. Calder’s toys
▪ In 1926 he moved to Paris,
where he met many artist
friends.
▪ He liked having parties
with his friends.
▪ He started selling toys to
make some money.
▪ His toys became very
popular.
Kangaroo, 1927
Fish, 1960.

7. Calder’s Circus
▪ Calder liked the circus so
much that he created one
for himself.
▪ His artist friends in Paris
(Miró, Man Ray,
Mondrian…) liked it very
much.
▪ He performed the circus in
many places in Europe and
USA.

9. Calder’s wire sculptures
▪ Calder created
portraits of his friends
and famous people at
the moment.
▪ He used wire and
space, so he made
sculptures in 3D.
Portrait of
Joan Miró

10. Calder’s stabiles
▪ In the 1930’s he started
making stabiles, static
sculptures made of metal.
▪ He built the sculptures
bigger and bigger.
▪ Now these sculptures are
in the streets of different
cities.

12. Flamingo,
In Chicago.

13. Man,
In Quebec.

14. Calder’s mobiles
▪ In Paris, Calder became very
good friend of Miró and
Mondrian. They influenced in
his art.
▪ Calder started doing abstract
art. He used geometrical
figures like circles and
squares.
▪ He invented the mobiles,
sculptures that moved.

18. Glass
fish

19. Standing mobiles

22. Núria Lorenzo
CLIL Art & Crafts at Can Raspalls
2015/2016