East Building Atrium - Calder's Last Great Mobile
A stop on Washington DC National Mall Walking Tour, a free self-guided tour.
I. M. Pei built the East Building around a skylit, triangular atrium, and hanging in it is the largest mobile Alexander Calder ever designed. The gallery commissioned it in 1972 for the space.
Calder died in 1976, before it was finished, and engineers completed it from his model. To keep it light enough to move, they made it of aluminum instead of steel; even so, it weighs about 920 pounds and spans roughly 76 feet. It was hung in November 1977, before the building opened, and it drifts slowly in the air currents of the atrium.
It was taken down in 2020 for cleaning and conservation while the atrium skylight was replaced, and it was rehung in the same place in 2022. Look for the deep red and black paddles turning against Pei's sharp angles.
When you have seen enough, head back to the stop and on to the next museum.
More on Wikipedia: Alexander Calder · I. M. Pei
Stops on this tour
- Washington Monument
- National Museum of African American History and Cu
- National Museum of American History
- Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History
- National Gallery of Art
- United States Capitol
- United States Botanic Garden
- National Museum of the American Indian
- National Air and Space Museum
- Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden
- The Smithsonian Institution Building - The Castle
- Freer Gallery of Art
- Jefferson Memorial
- World War II Memorial
- Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial
- Korean War Memorial
- Lincoln Memorial
- Vietnam Veterans Memorial
- White House Ellipse
- White House
- Lafayette Square