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Yellow Stalk

Artist/Maker (American, 1898–1976)
Date1950s
MediumBaked enamel on steel
DimensionsOverall: 6 1/4 × 3 1/8 × 8 7/16 × 1 1/4 in. (15.9 × 7.9 × 21.4 × 3.2 cm)
Credit LineGift of Katharine Kuh
Object number1980.109A-B
Status
Not on view
Copyright© Alexander Calder / Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York, NYMore Information
Alexander Calder trained in mechanical engineering, graduating from Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken in 1919. As the son and grandson of acclaimed sculptors, it is perhaps not surprising that his most identifiable creations fuse movement, energy, bright colors, and sculptural forms. In 1926, after initial training in painting at the Art Students League in New York City, Calder moved to Paris and met Joan Miró. Miró's and Klee's abstract, biomorphic forms and bright colors likely inspired him, and he began to create small wood and wire animals and other figures. It was after a visit to Piet Mondrian's studio in 1930 that Calder began to create abstract constructions and kinetic mobiles, making his first air-driven mobile (as opposed to motorized power) in 1932. By the 1960s, demand for the artist's commissioned largescale mobiles and stabiles had increased and Calder devoted more of his time to overseeing their fabrication, though he also continued to create smaller-scale works throughout his life.

Yellow Stalk was a gift of the artist to art critic, dealer, and curator Katharine Kuh, who subsequently gave it to the AMAM. The museum also has in its collection Yellow Among Reds, one of Calder's large non-commissioned mobiles, two early paintings, and a number of the artist's drawings for the book Three Young Rats and Other Rhymes, published in 1944.
Exhibition History
The Child's Eye: From Klee to Disney
  • Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin, OH (May 5, 1981 - August 1, 1981 )
A Sense for Scale: Models and Miniatures by 20th-Century Masters
  • Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin, OH (July 1, 1995 - October 1, 1995 )
A Sense of Scale II: The Art of the Miniature
  • Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin, OH (October 27, 1998 - January 31, 1999 )
New Frontiers: American Art Since 1945
  • Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin, OH (August 29, 2006 - December 23, 2006 )
Starry Dome: Astronomy in Art and the Imagination
  • Allen Memorial Art Museum, Oberlin, OH (September 1, 2009 - December 23, 2009 )
Collections
  • Modern & Contemporary