An accomplished pen-and-ink illustrator in his early artistic career, Alexander Calder, who has been credited as inventing the mobile, took to gouache as his medium of choice for two-dimensional works. Although he had used it for years, it became an especially important creative outlet for him after 1953, when he had a self-described breakthrough while living in Aix-en-Provence. The following year, Calder established what he called a “gouacherie” in a small cottage on the property he owned in Saché. He worked there routinely, “doing some [gouaches] almost daily the way other people do morning exercises.”

In her introduction to the catalogue for an exhibition of Calder’s gouaches at the Long Beach Museum of Art in 1970, curator Wahneta T. Robinson describes Calder’s process for creating gouaches:

"Calder dampens the paper with a flow of water and, if there is too much, he tilts the paper and allows it to flow off. He waits until the paper dries to the proper state before drawing on it with his brush full of opaque color. This opaque medium has first been ground in water and mingled with a preparation of gum. The effect is characteristically flowing and unlabored, and opaque as oil pigment, but the manipulations and brush strokings are marked by the nature of a water medium.”

Calder’s grandfather and father were both sculptors, and his mother was a painter; with so much inventive energy surrounding his childhood, Calder’s own constructive impulses led him to the Stevens Institute of Technology, where, in 1919, he was awarded a degree in mechanical engineering. Four years later, Calder began formal art study at the Art Students League in New York. It was during this period that Calder worked as a freelance illustrator, visiting zoos and circuses to sketch and hone his creative craft.

In 1926, Calder moved to Paris, and during his seven year stay, he enchanted fellow artists Man Ray, Fernand Léger, Paul Klee, and Le Courbusier. Most importantly, Calder encountered Joan Miró and Piet Mondrian—it was through these two artists that Calder became increasingly aware of the possibilities of abstraction; their influence would be profound.

Calder’s whimsical use of irregular, biomorphic forms that recall the work of Miró reflected the influence of Surrealism and Dada, but it was the art and concepts of Mondrian that would have the most decisive impact on Calder’s work. Calder visited Mondrian’s studio in 1930 and later described how the experience transformed his understanding of abstract art. He wrote, “This one visit gave me a shock that started things. Though I had often heard the word ‘modern’ before, I did not consciously know or feel the term ‘abstract.’ So now at thirty-two, I wanted to paint and work in the abstract.” It is in Calder’s reduction of form and color palette to its simplest and most elementary state in which we see the power of Mondrian’s artistic influence.

In 1933, Calder reestablished his home base in the United States. He continued to make mobiles and painting, and began designing sets for performances by Martha Graham, Eric Satie and other actors of the time. In 1953, the Calder family purchased a home in rural France and began dividing their time between the US, France, and periods of extended travel. It was during the 1950’s when gouache became an important creative outlet for the artist. Its fluidity makes it easy to apply, and the fact that it is a water-based medium means it dries quickly—gouache allowed Calder to work fast, and the opacity of the medium left bold marks that capture the energy of his brushstroke.

Large-scale sculptures commissioned for public spaces dominate Calder’s late career. Their vibrant colors and sweeping arches offer a counterpoint to the clean straight lines of Modern architecture, breathing life into the environments that surround them. An excellent example of this is Calder’s stabile entitled Flamingo (1973, Federal Center Plaza, Chicago) and the blocky enormity of the Mies van der Rohe that surrounds it.

Movement, shown in two-dimensions or three, as a mobile or stabile sculpture, is a staple to Calder’s artistic mission. This, along with a primary color palette and irregular Surrealist forms, are themes that span Calder’s early and mature works.