Alexander Calder & Fischli-Weiss

Book excerpt: The American artist Alexander Calder (1898-1976) and Swiss artists Peter Fischli (born 1952) and David Weiss (1946-2012) have all sought and found quintessential ways of rendering a moment of fragile balance in art--a temporary state at once precarious and propitious. With Calder's groundbreaking invention of the mobile in the early 1930s, and Fischli/Weiss's collaborative creative work from 1979 onwards, these artists each lent the theme of fragile balance an iconic form of a very different kind. At first glance, both positions could hardly be more different; later, however, they proved to be two sides of the same coin, the result of different perspectives on the same theme at different times. This elaborately designed, richly illustrated catalogue with accompanying essays provides insight into both oeuvres.