“Calder’s Radical Classicism” Jed Perl keynote talk
Calder knocked sculpture off the pedestal. He wanted his work to be a part of life, to be touched, handled, walked around, discovered in unexpected places, much as sculpture had been in earlier centuries. By looking at Calder’s stabiles and mobiles along with older works of art – the carvings on a medieval cathedral, a Baroque altarpiece – Jed Perl will show how this modern master reenergized sculpture’s muscular and visceral powers and forged the radical classicism that defines his achievement.
Among Jed Perl’s many books are Antoine’s Alphabet, Eyewitness, and New Art City, which was a 2005 New York Times Notable Book. Writing in the New York Times about Perl’s latest book, Authority and Freedom: A Defense of the Arts, the composer John Adams observed that Perl “radiates sheer pleasure with his very personal responses to art of all kinds, writing with warmth and a sense of gratitude.” Perl is also the editor of Art in America: 1945-1970, a 900-page anthology published by the Library of America. He has written for Harper’s, The New Criterion, The Threepenny Review, The Yale Review, Salmagundi, and many other publications. He is the recipient of awards from the Guggenheim Foundation, the American Academy in Rome, the Leon Levy Biography Center at the City University of New York, and the Ingram-Merrill Foundation.
When: Friday, May 17 at 7:00 pm
Where: Seattle Art Museum; 1300 1st Ave, Seattle, WA 98101
ID: White man in blue button up shirt, glancing toward camera and smiling. Yellow background with an abstract artwork in white, red and black behind the man.