The grand opening festivities begin on Saturday, September 20, with a free public parade, “Chaos and Kisses,” running from noon to 2 PM, led by artist Arto Lindsay. Organized by Marsha Perelman Senior Director of Programs Juana Berrío, the event highlights Philadelphia’s vibrant community spirit and reflects Calder Gardens’ unique approach, eschewing the traditional “museum” label for an immersive, narrative-free experience. The Calder Foundation, in partnership with the Barnes Foundation, will curate a rotating collection to keep the exhibits dynamic.

The $90 million project, backed by the City of Philadelphia and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, builds on the city’s artistic heritage, linking to landmarks like the William Penn statue by Calder’s grandfather and the Swann Memorial Fountain by his father. Featuring open-air galleries and 37,000 seasonal perennial plants, the site encourages visitors to connect personally with Calder’s art.

Via Christie’s: A conversation with Piet Oudolf on Philadelphia’s new Calder Gardens

Calder Gardens will be open Wednesday through Monday, 11 AM to 5 PM, starting September 21, offering free grounds access and timed indoor gallery tickets, inviting the public to explore a blend of art and nature.

Photos by Iwan Baan.

If you’re in Philadelphia to visit Calder Gardens, there’s also Calder’s Ghost mobile at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. It’s a large-scale, white abstract mobile hanging from the ceiling in the museum’s grand entrance hall. Originally created for the Guggenheim Museum, it spans 30 feet. Another one to see in Philadelphia is White Cascade at the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia, the world’s largest mobile, descending 100 feet and spanning about 60 feet wide, suspended in an 8-story atrium. Free public tours are available weekdays, reservations recommended via the bank’s website. I’d suggest verifying these details before going, they may change from time to time.

Related to the official opening of Calder Gardens:

George Rickey, while outlining the early explorations by artists into kinetic art from 1912 to 1932 in his book Constructivism – Origins and Evolution (published in 1967, and to my knowledge, the most wide-ranging and comprehensive book on the subject of Constructivism to date), remarked: “It was Calder who succeeded in securing a place for kinetic art. He started making mobiles twelve years after Gabo’s Manifesto, and his first exhibition of these was in 1932 at the Galérie Maeght in Paris. Although his mobiles have since become famous and popular and have enlarged the limits of art, his style, deriving from painterly concepts, has had little influence on the new generation, especially the more mechanically inclined. Until his stabiles of the last decade, Calder retained a two-dimensional outlook in sculpture devised as outline drawings, often witty, with ingratiating movement added. He seemed indifferent to the wide possibilities of a kinetic art. He discovered a new world but did not explore it.“

To put the idea in different words: Calder’s process began with seeing Piet Mondrian‘s paintings and feeling the impulse to make the static abstract shapes in the paintings move. He translated this idea to his mobiles quite precisely, essentially creating two-dimensional abstract paintings made of a series of flat shapes that move. Most of them only happen to become three-dimensional because these two-dimensional abstract “paintings” (essentially two-dimensional planes made of a series of flat shapes) happen to curve three-dimensionally when moved by air currents. He remained devoted to this approach with his mobiles and veered from it only very rarely, and not far when he did.

In 1962, in a review in Arts Magazine of an exhibit of Calder’s work at Tate [PDF], George Rickey wrote: “The mobile, even if flexible, is two-dimensional, like a drawing on a rubber sheet. The sinuous tracery of each set of wires profiles may sit contrapuntally against the next, but flat against flat. With the parts swinging around a vertical axis, the galaxy occupies space but does not energize it. Calder has run through the permutations of these wire profiles; yet, apart from some perfecting of wire technology, extension and refinement of his vocabulary of shapes (the Arpesque flame forms are the best), and increased size, he shows very little advance in the expressive use of movement in the thirty years since Calderberry Bush [also known as Object with Red Discs, made in 1932 and regarded as Calder’s first mobile sculpture]. It is not the first time that an artist has been confined by his own invention; it happened to Samuel F. B. Morse. The Master of the Catenaries has become the prisoner of the chain he forged.“

To expand Calder’s idea, one could create mobiles with the same balance structure as Calder’s mobiles (based on the whippletree mechanism), and create moving abstract “paintings” that are truly three-dimensional, not just two-dimensional planes made of a series of flat shapes that curve with the air currents.

In his later years, Calder designed and made some of his mobiles consisting of two (or more) horizontal and vertical planes, each one being essentially arranged in two dimensions. His hanging mobile titled Lone Red Among Blacks (1961) is a good example to illustrate this. Here again, the three-dimensionality was a result of combining two or more “flat” two-dimensional arrangements, not of a fully three-dimensional arrangement.

These mobiles shown here are still designed with the interconnected balance structure where the balance of each part depends on the other parts, as in a Calder mobile. And same as in Calder’s mobiles, it’s essentially an upside down whippletree mechanism, which probably dates back to between 190 to 209 AD, and has been used to distribute force evenly through linkages when horses or mules pull a plow or a wagon:

Man Ray was the first artist (to my knowledge) to utilize this balance structure in a suspended sculpture with his piece titled Obstruction in 1920 (if you’d like to read more about the history of mobiles, please see my page Mobiles before Calder – Who Invented Mobiles – A History of Mobiles Part 1).

Almost all artists who have made mobiles since Calder have adapted his two-dimensional approach. Few have worked to move beyond and explore the possibilities of fully three-dimensionally designed mobiles that utilize the interconnected balance structure that distinguishes them from simply suspended sculptures (please see my page Mobile Sculpture Artists – A History of Mobiles – Part 2 for some examples). George Rickey recognized the limitations of Calder’s two-dimensional approach to mobiles and expanded the art form, although many of his pieces don’t utilize an interconnected balance structure throughout. After around 1950, he often also opted for standing sculptures instead of suspended ones. Lynn Chadwick, Tim Prentice, Jerome Kirk, Derick Pobell, Laurent Martin “Lo”, Philippe Jestin and Jade Oakley have found ways to some extend to free the art form of mobiles from Calder’s two-dimensional approach. Tim Prentice expressed the challenge in a conversation with Nicholas Fox Weber (published by Maxwell Davidson Gallery in 2000): “Calder was credited with inventing sculpture with moving parts, so for me Rickey was incredibly important because he demonstrated that this concept wasn’t any one man’s property. I can do it to a limited degree. I can draw a line and have it curve, undulate, curl, turn, twist – in that sense, the line is changing – and I can do it with planes. The next challenge would be to do it with volume.” Volume as in three-dimensional planes instead of two-dimensional planes? Or no planes at all?

On the topic of Calder and Rickey, Tim Prentice wrote in his book Drawing on the Air – The Kinetic Sculptures of Tim Prentice: “If you compare the two, Calder was a great storyteller [and an entertainer] and not a theorist. When anyone asked him tough questions about his work, he hid behind his humor. For example, when asked how he knew a piece was finished, he famously answered, “When it’s dinner time.” He operated entirely on intuition. By contrast, Rickey was an intellectual and teacher. He was far more strict in his use of Constructivist principles. He analytically isolated movement in the way Josef Albers isolated color. [Rickey] and Calder represent the two contrasting sides of the brain.” Tim Prentice’s work greatly expands the art form of mobiles. He seems to build on Rickey’s approach more than on Calder’s. As he himself has explained: “As I concentrated on reducing weight and friction, the decisions came to be based more on engineering and less on aesthetics” and “we make the machine and keep our artistic instincts out of it and the air comes along and does the art.” Can the contrasting approaches be combined in new ways?

Building on Calder’s hanging mobile 13 Spines (1940):

Photos reverse the idea of turning an abstract painting or drawing into a three-dimensional moving sculpture. They turn it back into a flat immobile image made of abstract shapes. Two-dimensional layouts in mobiles, like many of Calder’s mobiles and the more conventional mobile sculptures I made some years ago, are easier to capture and comprehend in photos. While video can provide a solution to this, most people discover new art in the form of photos nowadays, especially now in the digital age. You can make an amazing three-dimensional sculpture, but if the sculpture doesn’t allow you to represent its idea comprehensively in images and photos, then you’re limiting the reach of the idea greatly. As Sarah Sze put it in an interview with Melissa Chiu: “In many ways, great artworks are known primarily through photos – so arguably the photos are as important as the artworks themselves.”

An approach that seems architectural to me:

The balance structure of a mobile (the whippletree mechanism) is like a few simple chords on an instrument: simple, but the possibilities of what can be done with it are infinite.

“Paintings are but research and experiment. I never do a painting as a work of art. All of them are researches.” – Pablo Picasso, in an interview with Alexander Liberman for Vogue in 1956.

Or as architect Santiago Calatrava has pointed out: the surrealist André Breton said, “Everyone knows what a head looks like”, to which Alberto Giacometti retorted: “Not me.”

See the continuation of this post Contemporary Mobile Sculptures – Expanding Calder’s Art Form – Part 2 with additional new mobile sculptures that I’m working on based on this approach.

As with anything on my website, if you have any suggestions, anything that should be added, corrected, or have any questions or comments, please let me know.

– See more of my mobiles –

Yet when I draw up proposals for these kinds of projects, I keep wondering where the lines are between a mobile that could be a replica, a mobile that’s strongly influenced by Calder’s style (“in the manner of Alexander Calder”), and a Calder inspired mobile. If I copied his style to a tee, most people wouldn’t be able to tell it from an original Calder mobile, yet it wouldn’t be a replica.

The question here is not simply about style, because Calder invented a new art form, and he still is to date by very far the most well known sculptor to create mobiles. This could be compared to Wassily Kandinsky, who is often (arguably) noted as having created the first abstract paintings starting in 1911, and then attributing all abstract paintings that followed by others to his work. An important difference here being that compared to abstract painting, few kinetic sculptors have tried to create their own style of mobiles so far, and even then, the basic idea, and in many cases the structures of their mobiles, are based on Calder’s work, and in that way, most mobiles are Calder inspired, even if they’re original in style. However, the underlying idea and structure of Calder’s mobiles was not invented by Calder. It is based on Man Ray‘s 1920 piece titled Obstruction, which he made about 10 years before Calder started to make mobiles. It utilizes the same structure as a whippletree mechanism, which probably dates back to between 190 to 209 AD. For further reading on this topic, please see the photos below of Calder’s copy of Man Ray’s sculpture, and see my page Mobiles before Calder – Who Invented Mobiles – A History of Mobiles.

From a legal perspective, case law is telling us that style isn’t protected by copyright. In Steinberg v. Columbia Pictures, the court stated that style is merely one ingredient of expression and for there to be infringement, there has to be substantial similarity between the original work and the new, purportedly infringing, work. In Dave Grossman Designs v. Bortin, the court said that:

“The law of copyright is clear that only specific expressions of an idea may be copyrighted, that other parties may copy that idea, but that other parties may not copy that specific expression of the idea or portions thereof. For example, Picasso may be entitled to a copyright on his portrait of three women painted in his Cubist motif. Any artist, however, may paint a picture of any subject in the Cubist motif, including a portrait of three women, and not violate Picasso’s copyright so long as the second artist does not substantially copy Picasso’s specific expression of his idea.”

For more on the legal perspective, there’s a great article by Greg Kanaan titled You Can’t Copyright Style.

The sculptor Jerome Kirk, who in his early career was strongly influenced by Calder, went to visit him at his studio around 1954, and described the encounter in his book: “Low on money and feeling the need for some encouragement, I visited Alexander Calder at his home in Roxbury, Connecticut. To enter his studio was like walking into a dream world. There were large work benches, vices, anvils and a magnificent clutter of tools, wire and sheet metal. His mobiles and stabiles of varying sizes were everywhere. At first Calder seemed interested in wanting to know what I was all about, but his cordiality gave way to petulance after seeing examples of my work. Guessing that he resented the close resemblance of my work to his own, I left discouraged, saddened and angry.” Jerome Kirk went on to creating his own very original style with his kinetic sculptures.

A standing mobile by Arthur Bauman:

A standing mobile by Calder (Quatre Blancs, 1976):

Here’s Calder (with Klaus Perls) at his 1956 exhibit at Perls Galleries with his mobile Untitled – Mobile with N Degrees of Freedom that he made in 1946:

Calder’s mobile is essentially the same sculpture as Man Ray’s Obstruction (1920) just made with wire instead of coat hangers:

Pablo Picasso once said: “What does it mean for a painter to paint in the manner of So-and-So or to actually imitate someone else? What’s wrong with that? On the contrary, it’s a good idea. You should constantly try to paint like someone else. But the thing is, you can’t! You would like to. You try. But it turns out to be a botch. And it’s at the very moment that you make a botch of it that you’re yourself.” (Hélène Parmelin, Picasso: The Artist and His Model, and other recent Works, 1965, page 43)

Picasso in his studio in 1956 standing next to a mobile not made by Calder:

Pablo Picasso and Alexander Calder knew each other and crossed paths in Paris’s vibrant art scene during the late 1920s and 1930s. Their acquaintance likely began around 1926 to 1933, when Calder was living in Paris, creating his Cirque Calder and early mobiles, and Picasso was an established figure in Montparnasse and the Surrealist circle. A key moment in their relationship came in 1937 during the International Exposition in Paris, where both contributed major works to the Spanish Pavilion, a project organized to support the Spanish Republic during the Civil War. Picasso created his monumental Guernica, while Calder designed the kinetic Mercury Fountain. They collaborated closely with architects Josep Lluís Sert and Luis Lacasa on the pavilion’s layout, fostering direct interaction. Calder admired Picasso’s inventive spirit, and Picasso, intrigued by Calder’s innovative use of movement in sculpture, reportedly visited his studio. Their mutual connections, including artists like Joan Miró and Surrealist circles, further facilitated their acquaintance. While not intimate friends, their shared artistic environment and the 1937 pavilion project cemented a professional respect and familiarity during their time in Paris.

On the topic of style, as in style in fine art and art movements, Calder is widely regarded as one of America’s most important surrealists, although he did not consider himself an abstract artist, as noted by Milly Burroughs. When pressed on this matter in an interview, Calder explained that his penchant for kinetic art and other-worldly forms was his interpretation of what the universe might look like, and would therefore be Realism.

– Read more of my blog posts about mobiles or see some of my mobile sculptures –

Designed with python scripts and rendered in Rhino.

Mixing contemporary art with movement, Calder style mobiles with 21st century design elements.

One more time with some colors:

And a second idea using a design from our 3D Printed Hanging Sculptures:

[Update: See the finished mobiles installed at the atrium]

See more of my custom-designed and custom-made mobiles …

See more of my custom-made mobiles …

– Part 2 –

See more of my custom mobiles …

Links to various videos of the installation keep floating around social media sites calling it “the largest kinetic sculpture in the world”, spanning an area of 75 square meters (810 sq ft) and a height of 7.3 meters (24 ft). While the sculpture is an amazing accomplishment, it doesn’t seem to be the world’s largest kinetic sculpture. To my knowledge, the largest kinetic sculpture in the world (and also the largest mobile sculpture) is Alexander Calder‘s White Cascade, which hangs in the Eastburn Court of the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia:

It measures approximately 100 feet (31 meters) from top to bottom, is 60 feet (18 meters) at its widest point, and weighs close to 10 tons, including the motor, surpassing Calder’s 920 pound 76-foot-long mobile (or 85 feet, depending on source) at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC. I’m not sure if any of his stabiles are larger, but if not, then this would also be Alexander Calder’s largest sculpture. Speaking of that large Calder mobile at the National Gallery, it is made with hollow honeycomb-type structures designed by Paul Matisse (grandson of Henri Matisse and son of Pierre Matisse) and covered with paper-thin aluminum, and aluminum and steel bars, with the stress points being strengthened with molybdenum. It weighs 930 pounds (422 kg). The previous estimates from Calder’s foundry in Biémont exceeded 5000 pounds (2268 kg). It doesn’t have a name. When Calder was asked for a title, he replied “You don’t name a baby until it is born.” But then he passed away one year before it was installed at the Gallery. The mobile sculpture has been refurbished recently.

Back to White Cascade: It took just two days to install it. The installation was carried out in two stages. In the most difficult and time-consuming part of the job, the four top-most and largest aluminum discs — still in their protective wrappings — were joined to their respective stainless steel rods, then raised one by one and linked together. The 10 lower discs and rods were linked together on the ground level, then raised into position as a unit. A crane situated on the sidewalk outside the entrance to the Bank provided the lifting power.

Finally, the wrappings were removed. The 14 white aluminum discs that comprise “White Cascade” range in size from 3.5 feet in diameter to 12.7 feet. The longest of the connecting stainless steel rods is 36 feet; the shortest, 9 feet. Powered by an electric motor, the mobile rotates clockwise on a radius of 32.5 feet.

Here’s a photo by H. Scott Heist of Calder in front of the mobile:

The mobile was installed in May 1976, Calder passed away less than six months later.

Do you know of a larger kinetic sculpture? Let me know if you do and I’ll add it to this post.

Current relevance as of September 2025: No newer kinetic sculptures surpassing White Cascade in size have been widely reported in searches up to this date.

Also see my list of the 5 Largest Mobiles worldwide that I’m aware of.

– Update: –

I received an email from Anthony Howe nominating his OCTO 3 sculpture as possibly the largest outdoor permanent kinetic wind sculpture. It measures 25′ h x 30′ w x 30′ d (7.6m x 9.1m x 9.1m) and weighs 7000 pounds (3200 kg):

Since receiving the email from Anthony, it seems that he has surpassed these dimensions with the cauldron he created for the 2016 Rio Olympics measuring 40 ft (12.2 meters):

Related: Watch as Anthony Howe creates a massive, kinetic wind sculpture

– See some of my kinetic sculptures and mobiles –

Alexander Calder, Maripose, 1960, 30 x 67in.

Bonhams will offer Alexander Calder‘s (1898-1976) 1960 sculpture Maripose in the November 12 2013 Contemporary Art auction (est. $1,200,000-1,600,000). This stunning example of Calder’s large scale mobiles has been in private American hands for nearly 40 years in Wisconsin-based collections.

A native of Pennsylvania, Calder was born into a family of sculptors. His first solo show was held in Paris in 1927 while he was still in his twenties; he would soon become one of America’s most lauded and prolific artists. It was Marcel Duchamp who first dubbed Calder’s kinetic wire sculptures “mobiles,” – these hanging, interactive pieces would come to define the artist’s legacy.

Maripose was originally offered at Perls Gallery in New York, which represented Calder from 1954 until the artist’s death. The mobile was acquired in 1976 by a prominent private collector from Milwaukee’s Irving Galleries, and passed by descent to the present owner in 1988. The mobile was exhibited at the Milwaukee Art Museum in 1987, and is registered with the Calder Foundation.

“In Maripose, every element of Calder’s genius is evident through the striking sense of balance and momentum the sculpture evokes,” said Jeremy Goldsmith, Bonhams Director of Contemporary Art in New York. “It’s a pleasure to bring such an important work to the market after nearly four decades in private hands.”

The auction will preview at Bonhams November 9-12 2013.

via Eric Cohler Design NYC

This scholarly exhibition – including loans from private European collections and Museo Carandente Palazzo Collicola – is a rare opportunity to view many works which have never been publicly exhibited in the UK. While these artists were separated geographically, their respective bodies of work share many technical and aesthetic sympathies. Both artists employed a lyrical expressiveness in the often stolid medium of constructed metal sculpture. Influenced by both the Surrealists and Constructivists, Calder and Melotti were each attracted to working with iron and malleable alloys, using these materials to represent the balance of opposing forces. Both men were trained in engineering before turning to art and were interested in music and dance. Melotti trained as a pianist and often discussed his works in musical terms. Calder often collaborated with composers and choreographers. In their works, the precision of the engineer combines with a musician’s sense of rhythm, balance and play.

Read more …

Estimate $1,200,000 – $1,800,000 [Update: Price Realized $4,603,750]

Estimate $2,500,000 – $3,500,000 [Update: Price Realized $5,387,750]

Estimate $2,000,000 – $3,000,000 [Update: Price Realized $3,035,750]

Estimate $2,000,000 – $3,000,000 [Update: Price Realized $6,619,750]

– See a list of more original Calder mobiles for sale –

More info …

The post Calder at Pace London – April 19th – June 1st 2013 first appeared on Mobile Sculpture Artist - Calder inspired Kinetic Art.]]> https://www.marcomahler.com/simple-hanging-mobile-animation/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=simple-hanging-mobile-animation Thu, 07 Mar 2013 18:22:35 +0000 https://www.marcomahler.com/?p=2799 Getting there, getting there … simple hanging mobile calculated and animated: See more of my videos of mobile sculptures and kinetic sculptures.

Just a little fun kinetic sculpture balance animation I just created:

See more of my videos of mobile sculptures and kinetic sculptures.

For sale soon…

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———-

Update:
Delivered and for sale as of March 5th 2013

Direct link to kinetic sculptures for sale in their online store

Once in a while I go look around and see what other mobile makers / kinetic sculptors / hanging art installation designers are up to. Here are some of the cooler hanging sculptures (some kinetic, some not) that I came across this time around:

Made of hardware items:

Misawa Aviation and Science Museum:

Astrid Bin:

Ratcliffe Fowler Design – made with 3000 soccer balls:

Maurizio Cattelan, this being his instillation at the Guggenheim Museum (more recently, he received a lot of attention for taping bananas to a wall):

Scabetti Design:

Stu Scheckter:

Lobby at Hilton San Diego:

Claire Morgan:

Ed Carpenter – looking mid-century modern with a splash of contemporary to me:

Program Collective:

Chris Dorosz:

Ball Nogues Studio:

Crystal Schenk:

Cornelia Parker:

Kaarina Kaikkonen:

Putra World Trade Centre:

Ralph Helmick and Stu Schechter:

Mathilde Roussel – that’s real growing grass (obviously reminds me of “Mad Men“):

Lobby at Hyatt:

And the kinetic sculpture at the BMW Museum:

I gave credit where I was able to find it, but sadly all too often, when you see one of these installations in lobbies, atriums (atria) and similar spaces, there’s no plaque or anything anywhere that would tell you who designed, made and installed it.

Take a look at some of my large suspended sculptures, and if you’re interested in the history of hanging sculptures, specifically mobiles, please see my posts A History of Mobiles (Part 1) and the continuation Mobile Sculpture Artists – A History of Mobiles (Part 2).

Homage To Calder from Carl Kleiner on Vimeo

I’d like to see a stabile with appetizers on it …

The “Snow Flurry” by Alexander Calder is the most expensive hanging mobile ever sold to date (May 2012), only surpassed by “Lily of Force” which is a stabile by Calder [Update: “Poisson volant (Flying Fish)“, a hanging mobile Calder made in 1957, sold for $25,925,000 on May 13th 2014, a new world auction record for Calder]. It realized a hammer price of US$10,386,500 at Christie’s Post-War and Contemporary Art Evening Sale at the Rockefeller Plaza, New York, on on May 8th 2012. Here’s a photo from the auction:

But here’s what confuses me about this. The following is the photo of “Snow Flurry” that Christie’s posted on their site. Count the elements on the mobile.

21 elements. Now, following is the photo of “Snow Flurry” that the Calder Foundation has on their site. Count the elements on that mobile, too.

30 elements. 9 elements more.

First I wondered if part (9 elements) of the “Snow Flurry” that the Calder Foundation has displayed maybe got lost or destroyed somehow, but then I noticed that besides the number of elements on each, if you pay close attention to the structure of each mobile you’ll realize, these are clearly two different mobiles.

My best guess would be that Calder made more than one hanging mobile with the same name. If that’s the case, I would be surprised that Christie’s wouldn’t be clarifying it in their description of the mobile.

The mobile sold came from Eliot Noyes‘ estate who was a friend of Calder’s.

I’ll post an update if I find out more.

Update: I received the following via email a couple of days ago from Jim in Portland, ME: “It appears that Calder made at least several numbered mobiles called Snow Flurry, all a little different. See this photo regarding the one at MoMA, which is identified as Snow Flurry I. There is one now at the Portland, ME Museum of Art (where I live), which is called Snow Flurry III. I presume the one that sold at auction in 2012, and which you mention in your original post, was a different Snow Flurry than either of these. I wonder how many of them he made? Snow Flurry III is really quite amazing in person.” Thanks, Jim!

__________

Here’s a beautiful video of the 21 element “Snow Flurry”:

Red, Orange and Blue
1949
painted sheet metal and wire
148.6 x 132.1 x 101.6 cm (58.5 x 52 x 40 in)

Original Calder hanging mobiles are outside of most people’s budgets, being sold at fine art auctions from the hundreds of thousands to several millions of dollars, with $18.5 million being currently the most expensive hanging mobile ever sold. Consider one of my hanging mobiles instead or get in touch with me for a custom hanging mobile. Please keep in mind that I am not (nor is anyone else) allowed to make a Calder replica / copy / reproduction. All his works are copyrighted and it would be illegal to do so. Please see my post Calder Replicas, Calder Style Mobiles, Calder Inspired Mobiles for more on this topic.

The shapes would be made out of aluminum sheet metal to keep the mobiles light and sensitive to air currents / wind (keeping them kinetic)
Each element in these hanging mobiles can rotate full circle independently from the other elements in the mobile, giving the mobiles theoretically and infinite number of ways to align themselves

More custom hanging mobiles …

The Los Angeles Times just published a very nice article about him and The New York Times just put up a slide show with some of his photographs including this one of Alexander Calder.

[Update:]

PBS will premiere a new film that explores Guerrero’s life and work titled American Masters — Pedro E. Guerrero: A Photographer’s Journey on Friday, September 18 2015 at 9 p.m. Here’s a preview:

Works of Calder
Graphics Pioneer Herbert Matter’s Rarely Seen Film Marks Sculptor Alexander Calder‘s Birth

Surrounded by the hypnotic rhythm of his own sculptures in motion, legendary artist Alexander Calder is shown working in his studio in this clip from visionary photographer and graphic designer Herbert Matter.

I still don’t have them for sale in the shop, I just keep thinking I need to improve them a little more before they’re “retail ready”. I’m also experimenting with them to see if they could be installed outdoors as a kinetic garden sculpture, in front of a commercial building, public art, http://www.buyambienmed.com etc. maybe even as large scale sculptures.

They’re true “stabiles”, a term I see sometimes defined as “an abstract sculpture resembling a mobile but having no moving parts.” I always thought of a “stabile” as a standing mobile, as opposed to a hanging mobile, though.

I think these abstract sculptures have mid century modern elements, they also have a very new and contemporary design element to them, and I think they are rather unique and differentiate themselves nicely from the works of other kinetic sculptors such as Lyman Whitaker, Len Lye, Theo Jansen, Reuben Margolin, Arthur Ganson, Yaacov Agam, Fletcher Benton, Starr Kempf, Ralfonso Gschwend, and Alexander Calder (obviously more known for his hanging mobiles than his stabiles).

See my ready-made hanging mobiles for sale (also available through Etsy) or get in touch for a custom made hanging mobile or hanging kinetic art installation …

The post Drawings of Kinetic Sculptures – Stabiles first appeared on Mobile Sculpture Artist - Calder inspired Kinetic Art.]]> https://www.marcomahler.com/calder-hanging-mobile-shapes-mccartney-campaign/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=calder-hanging-mobile-shapes-mccartney-campaign Mon, 13 Aug 2012 05:54:15 +0000 https://www.marcomahler.com/?p=2574 Alexander Calder’s hanging mobile shapes are all over Stella McCartney‘s Fall/Winter 2012 campaign. See the following campaign video: No mention of Calder in the official press release though: “Cutting into the tradition of the English countryside with urban energy, colour and shine. Jacquard is textured. Embossed on double crepe in rich hues of bark, all […]

The design of the kinetic mobile is based on the architecture of the building. Made of aluminum, it weighs only about 8 pounds, which enables it to move with lighter air currents.

[Photo of unpainted mobile not on location – I should have one painted on location soon]

The four inner elements, meaning the red dotted circles inside the white circle with the arrows, can rotate full circle both as a group or independently from each other.

The following shape on the left symbolizes the architecture of the building. It can be found in the bay windows, the entrance to the building and in the courtyard. But to make it a little more dynamic and interesting for a mobile, the shape was stretched in different ways for each element like the ones with the arrows pointing to on the right.

To give the mobile a little more resistance to air currents (which will make it move) and to give it a little more presence when looking at it from a more horizontal angle, the shapes were given a fold in an angle that also brought back the angle found in the architecture of the building. It also gave the shapes a strong mid-century modern feel and provided an original design that distinguishes itself clearly from the designs of Alexander Calder’s mobiles.

If you’re interested in having me make a custom mobile or a hanging kinetic sculpture for you, small or large, please see my custom mobile page or contact me directly.

Posted on May 17, 2012

“Since I’ve recently become interested in making mobiles, I thought I would start checking out artists who actually know what they are doing.  Marco Mahler obviously does.  And with great style and artistry.  His beautiful mobiles are more stylish and ‘finished’ than what I’m interested in doing.

And, his are almost exclusively indoor models.  I want mine for outdoors where there is wind blowing!  So, nothing too delicate for me.  But, I love his work (and maybe he will be so thrilled about being Artist of the Day that he will give me a few clues!)

Update:  What a great guy!  Marco just sent me a link to a post of his that explains everything I wanted to know: https://www.marcomahler.com/how-to-make-mobiles“

Also, see my list of the 10 most expensive Alexander Calder mobiles sold at auction at Original Calder Mobiles For Sale – updated in September 2025.

Alexander Calder’s “Lily of Force”, a standing / hanging mobile he made in 1945, sold yesterday (May 8th 2012) at Christie’s in New York City for $18.5 million, making it the most expensive mobile ever sold (so far). Below is a video of the piece.

If you’re looking for a more affordable suspended mobile sculpture, please do take a look at my mobiles and consider commissioning me for a custom designed / custom made piece.

via Haus Interior
(click on “Portfolio” then “Long Island Residence”)

2011

10 feet tall – 5 feet wide
Three parts moving independently full circle
Sheet metal

[Click here to see the photo of the actual mobile installed]

Not a Calder reproduction / replica / copy, but definitely a modern / contemporary Calder inspired kinetic piece.

Read more at Cool Mom Picks …

The post Mobile 79 featured in Jenn Ski’s Home Studio on Apartment Therapy first appeared on Mobile Sculpture Artist - Calder inspired Kinetic Art.]]> https://www.marcomahler.com/dance-performance-show-soundtrack/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=dance-performance-show-soundtrack Thu, 22 Mar 2012 19:59:54 +0000 https://www.marcomahler.com/?p=2389 Fusion Dance Company’s 29th Annual Spring Show March 9-11, 2012 Brown University, Providence RI Choreographed by Michelle Le “Hike The Lake” by Marco Mahler Sarah Cho, Cameron Donald, Hannah Duron, Sarah Friedland, Michelle Le, Elise Miller, Rory Macfarlane, Anthony Rivera

The post Mobile 87 as Baby Mobile or Crib Mobile first appeared on Mobile Sculpture Artist - Calder inspired Kinetic Art.]]> https://www.marcomahler.com/original-calder-hanging-mobile-for-sale/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=original-calder-hanging-mobile-for-sale Tue, 28 Feb 2012 01:26:33 +0000 https://www.marcomahler.com/?p=2309 Sotheby's Contemporary Art auction on March 9th 2012 will include an original Alexander Calder mobile. Made with painted metal and wire in circa 1973, almost one cubic foot big, and signed, it is estimated to go for 200,000 to 300,000 USD.

Learn about the reintroduction of wolves into Yellowstone National Park. Wildlife stock footage graciously provided by Bob Landis | Landis Wildlife Films

Music
Seaport Window | David Merson Hess
Hike the Lake | Marco Mahler
Never Forget | Peterloo Massacre

Produced by ColorBURN Productions 2011

Even though I pride myself in having my own unique original style of art mobiles, I wouldn’t be making them if it wasn’t for Alexander Calder. If you don’t know anything about him, Alexander Calder was an American sculptor and artist most famous for his mobile sculptures. In addition to modern art mobile and kinetic sculpture, Alexander Calder also created paintings, lithographs, toys, tapestry, jewelry and household objects. Read more about him …

Here are some of my favorite Alexander Calder quotes:

“When an artist explains what he is doing, he usually has to do one of two things: either scrap what he has explained, or make his work fit in with the explanation.”

“The universe is real but you can’t see it. You have to imagine it. Once you imagine it, you can be realistic about reproducing it.”

“That others grasp what I have in mind seems unessential, at least as long as they have something else in theirs.”

“I think best in wire.”

Also featuring art mobiles by Gabriel Orozco, Clara von Zweigbergk and Julie Frith

At newsagents now

See more of my art mobiles …

Shot With A Nikon D700 taking a picture every 4 minutes for over two weeks. Most of these are harvester ants, so as their name imply, rather than eat everything on their way, they rearrange and deliver.

This piece was made for the Vimeo Weekend Project: Magic Cut.
Shot with Canon 7D
Zeiss 50mm Prime Lens
Music by: Marco Mahler