I really don’t know what to say, except that Jean-Luc Parant’s got a lot of balls to bury Alexander Calder’s custom-painted 1968 Citroen DS ID Break like that.
Which, well.
This is Parant’s schtick, and this work, titled « Animobiles et Autonimaux », un hommage à Calder, was installed in front of the Hotel Dassault, home to the auction house Artcurial, in the Summer of 2005. The occasion was a big Calder sale and the 50th anniversary of the DS.
None of which do I care about in the least. Because, hey ho, there’s Alexander freakin’ Calder’s freakin’ Citroen DS station wagon, people. What else matters, nothing, is my point.
This is not the car one associates with Calder, who very famously painted an early BMW Art Car. For me, Artist Cars are much more interesting.
Grey was, for Calder, a color for utilitarian objects, so as to not interfere with the art objects. I don’t know if that’s true. Or, frankly, if this really is Calder’s car. The plaque does come from Indre-et-Loire, where Calder’s Saché studio is located. But so far I have received no response from the Calder Foundation to my inquiries about the car. So we are free to speculate.
This and several other installation photos from the seductive DS color variant site: Gris Calder (1968) [nuancierds.fr]
Thanks to Artcurial for details of Jean-Luc Parant’s installation.
Previously/related: Richard Serra’s Suburban
Olafur’s gnarly rigs
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the making of, by greg allen