Alexander Calder: The New Calder Gallery at Fondation Beyeler

The Calder Gallery that recently opened at Fondation Beyeler in Riehen (Switzerland) is a collaboration between the Calder Foundation and Fondation Beyeler. In a dedicated space in the museum, selected works by the American artist Alexander Calder will be shown. The project is intended to run for several years in a series of curated presentations. The first presentation is curated by Theodora Vischer. In this interview, Theodora Vischer and Alexander Calder’s grandson, Alexander S. C. Rower (Chairman and President of the Calder Foundation) talk about the exhibition and the project.

The aim of the Calder Gallery project is to provide a permanent presence at the Fondation Beyeler of works by Alexander Calder (1898 – 1976). The first Calder Gallery is a tribute to Mary Calder Rower, the artist’s younger daughter. She passed away last year and bequeathed more than 1,000 of her father’s works to the Calder Foundation. The current Calder Gallery presentation presents selected works, beginning with pieces from the early 1930s, Alexander Calder’s years in Paris, when he started to create kinetic sculptures. The exhibition continues with works from the early 1940s and closes with a mobile from the last year of Alexander Calder’s life, 1976.

The first Calder Gallery presentation is curated by Theodora Vischer (Senior Curator, Fondation Beyeler) and runs until May 2013. The Calder Gallery will be reinstalled at regular intervals. A magazine will accompany each exhibition. The first issue contains a conversation between Alexander S. C. Rower and Theodora Vischer, and texts by Alexander Calder, Jean-Paul Sartre, and a chronology of the life and work of Alexander Calder.

Alexander Calder: Calder Gallery at Fondation Beyeler. Gallery Walk-through and interview with Theodora Vischer and Alexander S. C. Rower. Fondation Beyeler, Riehen (Switzerland), June 14, 2012.

Update (June 28, 2013): The second Calder Gallery is on view now (until 2014). Click here for an exhibition walkthrough and an interview with Alexander S. C. Rower (President and Chairman, Calder Foundation) and Oliver Wick (Curator at Large, Fondation Beyeler).

> Right-click (Mac: ctrl-click) this link to download Quicktime video file.

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