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What materials did Alexander Calder use to make Cirque Calder?
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Alexander Calder
American artist Alexander Calder with one of his mobiles in his Roxbury, Connecticut, studio.
Alexander Calder created his miniature masterpiece, Cirque Calder (1926ā31), using a variety of accessible materials. The performers and animals that populated his miniature big top were constructed from bits and pieces of:
- Cloth
- Yarn
- Cork
- Wire1
Calder designed these figures as spring-action and pull-toy elements, which he would animate during performances to explore the physics of motionāa process that ultimately informed his later development of the mobile.1