Les annees parisiennes (The Parisian years), 1926-1933. He is well known for the large mobiles and stabiles of painted metal. As well as presenting outstanding pieces, the exhibition offers an opportunity to witness the original state of works conceived in terms of motion and equilibrium but now condemned to immobility by the exactions of time or by the death of their creator and animator, these being here accompanied by films such as Jean Painleve's and photographs such as Brassai's, in which they are shown being operated by Calder himself.
Commissaires / organisateurs: Mnam/Cci - Brigitte Léal
A "transatlantic" artist, Alexander Calder (1898-1976) is well known here for the large mobiles and stabiles of painted metal to be seen in French cities and parks. As well as presenting outstanding pieces, the exhibition offers an opportunity to witness the original state of works conceived in terms of motion and equilibrium but now condemned to immobility by the exactions of time or by the death of their creator and animator, these being here accompanied by films such as Jean Painlevé's and photographs such as Brassaï's, in which they are shown being operated by Calder himself.
Little animals of bent metal, acute magazine illustrations, toys sparkling with colour and ingenuity: the young Calder's earliest works offer a key to his art, the art of an inspired DIYer, of a magician who took base materials and primitive mechanisms and transformed them into true sculpture. These assemblies of recycled materials and objects, held together by wire, provided the models for his first masterpiece, the Circus, produced in Paris between 1926 and 1931.
Until 11/5/09
The first personal exhibition from Asger Jorn in a Parisian museum since 1978. "Stay right in touch, and distinguished with it. Painting is done for. Might as well give it the coup de grâce. Turn it around. Long live painting."
Asger Jorn (1914-1973), the co-founder of the Cobra movement in 1948, was the most significant Danish artist of the 20th century. He spent a large part of his life in France, where in the 1930s he studied at the Fernand Léger studio. Then in the 1950s and 1960s he played a leading role in several avant-garde movements, most notably the International Movement for an Imaginist Bauhaus (1953-1957) and the Situationist International movement (1957-1960)...
Image: Alexander Calder. Joséphine Baker (IV), Danse vers 1928 © 2008 Calder Foundation, New York / Adagp, Paris 2009
Press contact
Head: Isabelle Danto
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assisted by Florian Richaud tel +33 (0)1 44784856 fax +33 (0)1 44781302 e-mail florian.richaud@centrepompidou.fr
Centre Pompidou
Place Georges Pompidou - Paris
Museum and Exhibitions: 11am to 9pm, (last admissions 8pm). Late nights every Thursday till 11pm for certain Exhibitions. Closed on Tuesdays and on May 1st.