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Lot Essay
An abstract base stands delicately with long, spindly wires spinning in a convergence of crossroads. In Branches Sans Feuilles, executed in 1946, Alexander Calder engages nature's unseen forces in realizing his incomparable, intuitive vision. The title for this nonobjective standing mobile—French for “branches without leaves”—was given after the fact of creation based on a vague description of forms. Calder doesn’t follow in the footsteps of plein air painters, representing anything in reality. In the artist's words, his mobiles are "not extractions, but abstractions... that are like nothing in life except in their manner of reacting" (A. Calder, quoted in Abstraction-Création, Art Non Figuratif, No. 1, Paris, 1932, p. 6. Translation courtesy Calder Foundation, New York). Branches Sans Feuilles was executed the year Calder returned to Paris after a stint in the United States, the year after World War II. It was made on an approachable scale, created from scrap metal and piano wire owing to the material shortages from the war efforts. Calder made a few similar works during this time period without his iconic sheet metal feuilles, as the title of this work suggests.
Calder revisited this form often in his decades-long career. His hanging mobiles are balanced, interconnected pieces of sheet metal suspended from the ceiling, while his standing mobiles feature kinetic elements dangling from a stable base. Many of the early mobiles were equipped with motors which made them move in a predetermined way. It was a motorized work that prompted fellow Parisian artist from the Dada group, Marcel Duchamp, to coin the term "mobile" for Calder's works in 1931. Calder decided, however, that these movements were too monotonous. After removing the motors, the mobiles could only be stirred by human touch or air currents, making the kinesis organic, unpredictable, and completely entrancing. This three dimensional connection to the viewer is what makes experiencing a Calder mobile, such as Branches Sans Feuilles, so electric. Circling the work and watching it respond to movement traps the viewer in a tête-à-tête, experiencing the pieces just as Calder did in his studio.
“I suggested to Mondrian that perhaps it would be fun to make these rectangles oscillate. And he, with a very serious countenance, said: ‘No, it is not necessary, my painting is already very fast.’… This one visit gave me a shock that started things.” Alexander Calder
The first year Calder travelled to Paris was 1926, and soon after his arrival he immersed himself in the vibrant art scene. The people he met there were astounded by his radical sculptural output, and in June 1931 he accepted an invitation to join Abstraction-Création. This was an association of abstract artists created in Paris in 1931 to promote the budding artistic style, including giants such as Wassily Kandinsky, Jean Arp, and Sonia Delaunay. Though Calder never formally joined any group—he exhibited with the Surrealists but did not sign their manifestos—he befriended many of the Abstraction-Création artists, one of the most significant being Piet Mondrian. Even with both artists’ concentration on abstraction, they both in their careers were inspired by universal forces, which manifested in their artistic output to eccentric and astonishing effects.
A visit to Mondrian’s studio in 1930 is seen by many scholars as a definitive turning point in Calder’s career. Calder recounted that when experiencing the space of Mondrian’s studio, he had this exchange: “I suggested to Mondrian that perhaps it would be fun to make these rectangles oscillate. And he, with a very serious countenance, said: ‘No, it is not necessary, my painting is already very fast.’… This one visit gave me a shock that started things,” (A. Calder, quoted in Calder: An Autobiography with Pictures, New York, 1966). Clearly, from the beginning Calder was thinking about abstraction from the viewpoint of a sculptor. He had been making his sculptures move since his performative Cirque Calder, an intricate arrangement of dozens of miniature figures and props, which Calder would manipulate during choreographed productions. Branches Sans Feuilles exudes the same dynamic liveliness. The long horizontal strands are reminiscent of balancing poles, dangling over the abyss in a gravity-defying feat. Calder’s fascination with balance and movement would become a remarkable strength in cementing him as a foremost innovator in art history.
Branches Sans Feuilles is both one of Calder’s treasured standing mobiles and bears unique qualities indicative of the period of his career directly after he returned to Paris in the 1940s. It has traveled all over the world in its lifetime, spending time in Geneva, Stockholm, London, Amsterdam, and New York. Having made a tour around the western art world, this work has been seen by many and contributed to Alexander Calder’s renown and lasting impact on art throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The work was featured in the radical 1961 exhibition Bewogen-Beweging (Moving Movement) at the Stedelijk Museum, that was the first time that a major museum recognized Nouveau Réalisme. He masterfully composes his kinetic sculptures to create a harmony between tension and ease, materiality and immateriality.
Calder revisited this form often in his decades-long career. His hanging mobiles are balanced, interconnected pieces of sheet metal suspended from the ceiling, while his standing mobiles feature kinetic elements dangling from a stable base. Many of the early mobiles were equipped with motors which made them move in a predetermined way. It was a motorized work that prompted fellow Parisian artist from the Dada group, Marcel Duchamp, to coin the term "mobile" for Calder's works in 1931. Calder decided, however, that these movements were too monotonous. After removing the motors, the mobiles could only be stirred by human touch or air currents, making the kinesis organic, unpredictable, and completely entrancing. This three dimensional connection to the viewer is what makes experiencing a Calder mobile, such as Branches Sans Feuilles, so electric. Circling the work and watching it respond to movement traps the viewer in a tête-à-tête, experiencing the pieces just as Calder did in his studio.
“I suggested to Mondrian that perhaps it would be fun to make these rectangles oscillate. And he, with a very serious countenance, said: ‘No, it is not necessary, my painting is already very fast.’… This one visit gave me a shock that started things.” Alexander Calder
The first year Calder travelled to Paris was 1926, and soon after his arrival he immersed himself in the vibrant art scene. The people he met there were astounded by his radical sculptural output, and in June 1931 he accepted an invitation to join Abstraction-Création. This was an association of abstract artists created in Paris in 1931 to promote the budding artistic style, including giants such as Wassily Kandinsky, Jean Arp, and Sonia Delaunay. Though Calder never formally joined any group—he exhibited with the Surrealists but did not sign their manifestos—he befriended many of the Abstraction-Création artists, one of the most significant being Piet Mondrian. Even with both artists’ concentration on abstraction, they both in their careers were inspired by universal forces, which manifested in their artistic output to eccentric and astonishing effects.
A visit to Mondrian’s studio in 1930 is seen by many scholars as a definitive turning point in Calder’s career. Calder recounted that when experiencing the space of Mondrian’s studio, he had this exchange: “I suggested to Mondrian that perhaps it would be fun to make these rectangles oscillate. And he, with a very serious countenance, said: ‘No, it is not necessary, my painting is already very fast.’… This one visit gave me a shock that started things,” (A. Calder, quoted in Calder: An Autobiography with Pictures, New York, 1966). Clearly, from the beginning Calder was thinking about abstraction from the viewpoint of a sculptor. He had been making his sculptures move since his performative Cirque Calder, an intricate arrangement of dozens of miniature figures and props, which Calder would manipulate during choreographed productions. Branches Sans Feuilles exudes the same dynamic liveliness. The long horizontal strands are reminiscent of balancing poles, dangling over the abyss in a gravity-defying feat. Calder’s fascination with balance and movement would become a remarkable strength in cementing him as a foremost innovator in art history.
Branches Sans Feuilles is both one of Calder’s treasured standing mobiles and bears unique qualities indicative of the period of his career directly after he returned to Paris in the 1940s. It has traveled all over the world in its lifetime, spending time in Geneva, Stockholm, London, Amsterdam, and New York. Having made a tour around the western art world, this work has been seen by many and contributed to Alexander Calder’s renown and lasting impact on art throughout the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The work was featured in the radical 1961 exhibition Bewogen-Beweging (Moving Movement) at the Stedelijk Museum, that was the first time that a major museum recognized Nouveau Réalisme. He masterfully composes his kinetic sculptures to create a harmony between tension and ease, materiality and immateriality.