Alexander Calder

The Estate of the Artist
M. Knoedler & Co., Inc., New York
The Greenberg Gallery, St. Louis
Private Collection, St. Louis (acquired from the above in 1983)

St. Louis, Greenberg Gallery and Missouri Botanical Garden, Calder in Retrospect, September - October 1983, p. 5 (text)

This sculpture is in excellent condition. It was recently repainted and the bolts were replaced, as recommended by the Calder Foundation. There are a few scattered minor whitish handling marks along the bottom edges of the front, back and right leg as illustrated. On the bottom front of the "C", there are two dark fingermarks from handling.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

Created in the last decade of Alexander Calder’s momentous career, The Micrometer, 1968, stands at the apex of the artist’s inimitable sculptural exploration. As he forged a revolutionary path through the art historical landscape of the Twentieth Century, Calder created a body of outstanding works that exist as brilliant amalgamations of the traditionally opposed arts of painting and sculpture. When, as a young man in the early 1930s, the artist debuted his signature mobiles, he dramatically impacted and forever altered the course of art history. Set in motion by air currents, these delicate, active sculptures were not only pioneering in design and concept, but were also the first of what would become Calder’s lifelong artistic vision. For his stabiles, a term coined for the stationary subset of Calder’s oeuvre, the sculptor maintained a visually active element in the sinuous linear design of their outlines and profiles, exquisitely evident in The Micrometer. As a result of his many innovations, Calder is today recognized as one of the few artists to both invent and practice his own category of art. From that moment of stylistic genesis, Calder’s corpus – defined primarily by his hanging mobile, standing mobile and stabile sculptures – persistently showcased his unrivaled aptitude for abstract sculpture. The Micrometer, with its seamless synthesis of grand design and delicate compositional balance, is truly archetypal of Calder’s ambitious technical practice and unique artistic vision.

Forged entirely out of jet black painted steel, the elegantly curved and beautifully counterbalanced composition of the present work belies its absolute solidity. The arcing C-shaped crown of the sculpture recalls the shape of an actual micrometer, which is a technical tool used to measure small distances or thicknesses and certainly an apt motif for Calder who studied mechanical engineering in his youth. The way in which Calder welded this top section to its outwardly sloping base is also evocative of a form even more personal and intimate: the artist’s interlocking “CA” monogram. Art historian Albert Elsen's commentary on the late work of this critically important artist is superbly displayed in The Micrometer: “In the late art of Alexander Calder one experiences the artist’s incessant work to achieve new victories of creativity over habit. The savoring of his successes is comparable to tasting vintage wine, enjoying the resonance a hard life has given the voice of Pearl Bailey or the masterly understated performance of Sir Laurence Olivier.” (Exh. Cat., Chicago, Museum of Contemporary Art, Alexander Calder: A Retrospective Exhibition, 1974, n.p.)  As Elsen sees it, Calder’s sustained output is the result of what might be termed a “romance” between Calder and his material. The Micrometer’s magisterial presence, combined with Calder’s passionate manipulation of his materials, results in a stunning paradigm of the artist’s unparalleled sculptural discourse. Discussing the evolution of Calder’s corpus of stabiles, Marc Glimcher writes, “In Calder’s hands these technologies transformed art, just as it had transformed the cities that the monumental stabiles would soon inhabit. Among all the great innovations by all the great artists of the first half of the century, this may well have been the one that made abstraction truly modern.” (Exh. Cat., New York, Pace Wildenstein, Calder: From Model to Monument, 2006, p. 8)