Alexander Calder (1898-1976), widely recognized for inventing the mobile, stands as one of the most influential artists of the twentieth century. Calder’s parents were artists, his father a sculptor and his mother a painter. He showed an early affinity for the arts; in his mid-twenties, he moved to New York to study at the Art Students League. His relocation to Paris in 1926 marked a significant period, as he created his famous Cirque Calder (1926-31), a distinctive and elaborate body of work that soon captivated the Parisian avant-garde. Other significant events in Calder's career were the creation of a new art genre in 1931 with his first kinetic nonobjective sculpture and the great retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art in 1943, arranged by James Johnson Sweeney and Duchamp. These moments solidified Calder’s position as a leading figure in the American contemporary art scene.

Calder’s work is featured in numerous permanent collections worldwide, including The Whitney Museum of American Art, the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the National Gallery Art in Washington, D.C., the Centre Pompidou in Paris, and the Tate Modern in London, among many others