Alexander Calder
To an engineer, good enough means perfect. With an artist, there's no such thing as perfect.Collection: Art
I paint with shapes.Collection: Art
Why must art be static? You look at an abstraction, sculptured or painted, an entirely exciting arrangement of planes, spheres, nuclei, entirely without meaning. It would be perfect, but it is always still. The next step in sculpture is motion.Collection: Art
Just as one can compose colors, or forms, so one can compose motions.
I have been making wire jewelry - and think I'll really do something with it, eventually.
My fan mail is enormous. Everyone is under six.
The underlying sense of form in my work has been the system of the universe, or part thereof. For that is a rather large model to work from.
Above all, art should be fun.Collection: Art
When everything goes right a mobile is a piece of poetry that dances with the joy of life and surprise!Collection: Joy
If you can imagine a thing, conjure it up in space then you can make it... The universe is real but you can't see it. You have to imagine it. Then you can be realistic about reproducing it.Collection: Real
The universe is real, but you can't see it. You have to imagine it.Collection: Real
To most people who look at a mobile, it's no more than a series of flat objects that move. To a few, though, it may be poetry.Collection: Art
Why must art be static? You look at an abstraction, sculptured or painted, an entirely exciting arrangement of planes, spheres, nuclei, entirely without meaning. It would be perfect but it is always still. The next step in sculpture is motion.Collection: Art
About my method of work: first it’s the state of mind—Elation (joy).Collection: Joy
I love red so much, I almost want to paint everything red.Collection: Color
The first inspiration I ever had was the cosmos, the planetary system.Collection: Inspiration
The basis of everything I do is the universe.Collection: Bases
My whole theory about art is the disparity that exists between form, masses and movement.Collection: Art
The trouble with a lot of artists today is that they have too much technique and equipment. They don't know what to do with it all. If you cut down on it, you can work more strongly within narrower limits.Collection: Success
The simplest forms in the universe are the sphere and the circle. I represent them by disks and then I vary them... spheres of different sizes, densities, colours and volumes, floating in space, traversing clouds, sprays of water, currents of air, viscosities and odours - of the greatest variety and disparity.Collection: Clouds
You see nature and then you try to emulate it.Collection: Nature
When an artist explains what he is doing, he usually has to do one of two things: either scrap what he has explained, or make his work fit in with the explanation.Collection: Artist
My fingers always seem busier than my mind.Collection: Art
The next step in sculpture is motion.Collection: Next Steps
The sense of motion in painting and sculpture has long been considered as one of the primary elements of the composition.Collection: Long
A mobile is an abstract sculpture made chiefly out of sheet metal, steel rods, wire and wood. Some or all of these elements move, propelled by electric motors, wind, water or by hand.Collection: Moving
That others grasp what I have in mind seems unessential, at least as long as they have something else in theirs.Collection: Long