Alexander Calder was born in 1898 in, Lawnton, Pennsylvania, and died in 1976 in New York. He was one of the most prolific and innovative sculptors of the twentieth century.
Calder —whose oeuvre encompasses sculpture, painting, drawing, printmaking, and jewelry, among other media—developed a masterful visual vocabulary that addresses the interplay of nature and abstraction, stillness and motion, monumentality and ephemerality.
Flying Dragon (1975)—which exemplifies Calder’s capacity to invest a powerful visual dynamism in his work regardless of scale—is among the last of the monumental works he made. While static, the striking sculpture transforms when viewed from different angles. Constructed from sheet metal, it is physically weighty but appears delicate due to its limited points of contact with the ground.
Blending the biomorphic with the architectonic, the highly ambitious Flying Dragon epitomizes Calder’s compositional genius. Fusing elegant lines with simple forms and vibrant color, it is a distinctive and evocative form that activates the elegant space around it. Due to its immense size, it leaves viewers with the sensation of an otherworldly being imbued with legendary strength.