Monumental Midtown Art Sculpture Leaving Town

“I thank the Calder Foundation for sharing this much-loved work with the people of Atlanta over the past 25 years,” Michael E. Shapiro, Nancy & Holcombe T. Green, Jr. director of the High Museum of Art, said in a news release.

“We have been fortunate to enjoy a longstanding relationship with the Foundation and President Alexander S. C. Rower, which has allowed the standing mobile to become an iconic feature of the Peachtree Street landscape in Midtown Atlanta. Though we will miss the work, we are very excited that others will have the opportunity to experience it as part of the exhibition at the Rijksmuseum.”

To allow Museum visitors to continue to enjoy Calder’s work after the departure of “Three Up, Three Down,” the High will install Calder’s mobile “Untitled” (1947) from the Museum’s permanent collection in the Modern & Contemporary Art galleries in 2014.

The 8 x 12 foot sculpture constructed of sheet metal and wire was acquired by the High in 1978 and was last on view in 2001. Calder (American, 1898 – 1976) is best known for innovating a type of kinetic sculpture, dubbed “mobiles” by Marcel Duchamp, which gave form to an entirely new type of art.

The High invites community members to come and bid farewell to the sculpture during Museum hours and to share their pictures with the work on the High’s Facebook page now through Jan. 12, prior to the sculpture’s departure.

“With the departure of the Calder sculpture, we have the opportunity to think about new ways to use this outdoor space. We are considering several different options which could include commissions, loans or acquisitions,” David Brenneman, director of collections and exhibitions at the High, said in the release.