PHILADELPHIA, PENN. - Thanks to a $5 million grant to the
Philadelphia Museum of Art from The Pew Charitable Trusts, the
Benjamin Franklin Parkway has become the site for a spectacular
and buoyant display of artistic treasures that will augment the
enjoyment of any stroll along the Benjamin Franklin Parkway for
years to come.
In a press briefing at the Rodin Museum, the Philadelphia Museum
of Art, The Pew Charitable Trusts and the Calder Foundation
presented to the public four outdoor sculptures by the
Philadelphia-born sculptor Alexander Calder (1898-1976), one of
the great artists of the Twentieth Century.
The much-anticipated installation -- three elegant black
sculptures now grace the garden of the Rodin Museum while a tall,
multicolored stabile/mobile commands the two-acre site of the
future Calder museum at 22nd Street and the Parkway -- is the
first in a succession of rotations in the 12-year program funded
by The Pew Charitable Trusts.
It brings Calder's celebrated works to Philadelphia, placing
these works in context with the achievements of his father,
Alexander Stirling Calder (1870-1945), who designed the Swann
Memorial Fountain (1924) at Logan Circle, and his grandfather,
Alexander Milne Calder (1846-1923), who designed the figure of
William Penn that stands atop City Hall's clock tower
(1886-1894).
On view in the Rodin Museum courtyard are "The Pagoda" (1963) and
"Snow Plow" (1963), two painted metal stabile sculptures lent
from the Calder Foundation, and "Three Discs, One Lacking"
(1968), owned by the City of Philadelphia and formerly on view at
the Pennsylvania Convention Center. Across the Parkway stands the
delicate sculpture "Ordinary" (1969), also on loan from the
Calder Foundation, which is a full 211/2 feet tall.
The works are from the period when the artist was most engaged in
the creation of outdoor sculptures on a monumental scale. With
the installation of Calder's works along the parkway,
Philadelphians and visitors alike can fully appreciate the
boldness and brilliance of Calder's art as they approach the area
where the new museum will rise.
Anne d'Harnoncourt, director and chief executive officer of the
Philadelphia Museum of Art, said, "We are deeply indebted to The
Pew Charitable Trusts. Not only does this initiative underscore
the importance of three generations of Alexander Calders to
Philadelphia, it further enhances Philadelphia's most splendid
boulevard. It will be spectacular to see the full achievement of
the youngest Alexander Calder exhibited in the city of his birth
and in the context of the sculpture of his father and
grandfather. We are thrilled to work with the Calder Foundation
on this project and are enormously grateful for the enthusiastic
support of the City of Philadelphia and the Fairmont Park
Commission."
Alexander Calder was the third generation of the accomplished
artistic family from Philadelphia. Alexander Milne Calder, who
immigrated to Philadelphia from Scotland, created some 200
sculptural decorations adorning City Hall in addition to the
much-loved bronze statue of "William Penn." Alexander Stirling
Calder, who was born in Philadelphia, was especially noted for
the "Swann Memorial Fountain" but also created many other
sculptures throughout the city and on the parkway. At the western
end of the parkway, Alexander Calder's ethereal mobile "Ghost"
(1964) is suspended in the great stair hall of the Philadelphia
Museum of Art.
Members of Calder's family formed the Calder Foundation in 1987
to promote and disseminate Alexander Calder's work. In
anticipation of establishing a Calder museum, the Calder
Foundation facilitated a temporary loan in 1999 to the City of
Philadelphia of a large-scale privately own stabile entitled
"Eagle" (1971).
During the 18-month period in which the sculpture was on view on
the Philadelphia Museum of Art's East Terrace, the art museum
explored the feasibility of helping to create and facilitate the
operations of a Calder museum situated on the parkway.
On February 14, 2001, Calder Foundation Director Alexander S.C.
Rower, Philadelphia Mayor John F. Street, representatives from
the Philadelphia Museum of Art along with other enthusiastic
supporters, announced the selection of this city for the Calder
museum and the Japan-based firm of Tadao Ando as architect.
In June 2001, The Pew Charitable Trusts announced its $5 million
grant to the Philadelphia Museum of Art to oversee the 12-year
project of installing the works of Alexander Calder along the
parkway.
Calder was born in Lawnton, Penn., in 1898. He graduated in 1919
from the Stevens Institute of Technology with a degree in
mechanical engineering. In 1923, after a series of assorted jobs,
he entered the Art Students League in New York and embarked on a
career that would revolutionize the course of modern sculpture
and earn him international renown.
From 1926 to 1929, his miniature wire circus sculpture and
performance piece "Cirque" brought him to the attention of the
art world's leading figures, including Miro, Leger, Mondrian and
Picasso.
He worked in a wide range of media and is best known for
inventing freely moving constructions suspended in air (for which
Marcel Duchamp coined the term "mobiles") and for his large
freestanding sculptures, "stabiles."
In the final decade before his death in 1976, Calder devoted
himself increasingly to monumental outdoor sculpture. His work
figures prominently in the modern collections of major museums
throughout the world, and a retrospective exhibition at the
National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., in 1998, also shown at
the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, attracted 603,700
visitors during its run in the two cities.
