Monument
Flamingo - Alexander Calder
Fifty-ton vermilion steel stabile arcing above a modernist plaza, built for people to walk beneath.
0:00≈ 2 min
Location
0:00≈ 2 min
About this audio guide
The Flamingo sculpture by Alexander Calder rises over a modernist plaza in downtown Chicago, and its guide starts with the parade the city threw for its 1974 unveiling, Calder himself riding in on a circus wagon. It traces his lifelong love of play back to a miniature circus he built by hand in 1920s Paris, and the government commission that asked him to fill this stark black plaza with something against the glass and steel towers by Mies van der Rohe. Walk beneath the arcing steel legs rather than just looking up at them from the sidewalk.
This audio guide was created using AI.