Alexander Calder was an American modern artist born in 1898 in Pennsylvania to a family of artists. He is most famous for inventing the mobile, a kinetic art form consisting of abstract shapes suspended from wires that move with air currents. After studying engineering, Calder began attending art school in New York in 1923 and created miniature circuses that fascinated him, leading to his interest in kinetic art and mobiles. He lived in Connecticut for most of his life, creating colorful abstract mobiles and sculptures until his death in 1976.

1. Alexander Calder
American Modern Artist (1898- 1976)
Inventor of the MOBILE
Created by Ms. Moore
Pinconning High School
Art Dept.

2. Calder’s
Childhood…
• Born into a family of artists in
Lawnton, Pennsylvania
• Father was a prominent sculptor;
Mother was a painter
• In 1902, at the age of 4, Alexander
created his first sculpture- a clay
elephant
• Discouraged from becoming an artist
professionally, but supported as an
artist
Alexander Calder on the beach with his mother in
1909

3. • After studying engineering,
in 1923 Calder began
attending the Art Students’
League in New York
• Freelance artist for the
National Police Gazette
• Assignment: Ringling
Brothers’s and Barnum &
Baily Circus- beginning of
his fascination with the
circus

4. Moved to Paris in 1926 & built a
miniature circus…

5. Interest in Kinetic art led him to
create Mobiles, an art form for
which he is given credit for…

7.  Playful with his work bringing humor and a sense of
play to his work
 Made wire portraits
 Began to make moving sculptures
 Artist Marcel Dunchamp called Calder’s work
“mobiles” from the French word “to move”
 Lived in Roxbury, Connecticut with his wife Louisa
James almost his entire life
 Colorful, abstract forms in red, blue, yellow & black

12. Joan Miro Piet Mondrian
Interested in the work of Joan Miro
and Piet Mondrian…

13. Alexander Calder
died from a heart
attack in 1976. He
was committed to
creating art until his
death.