There were claims that Duchamp suggested the mobile form to Calder. In the
thirties, Calder was in Paris, making his wire portraits of Josephine Baker
and others. Clay Spohn, a very curious artist from San Francisco who was a
conceptual _bricoleur_ and who did some of the first assemblage art in
California, was also in Paris at that time, and he knew both Calder and
Duchamp. Spohn told me that he had actually been the one to suggest the idea
of the mobile to Calder. I had heard that it was Duchamp, and asked Marcel
about that. He laughed and said, "Oh, people have always misunderstood.
Spohn, this strange American whom I enjoyed very much, suggested to Calder
that he take the little parts and balance them on wires to make these
contraptions. What I did was to name it. What I invented was the word
_mobile_."
--Walter Hopps, "Gimme Strength: Joseph Cornell and Marcel Duchamp
Remembered" in JOSEPH CORNELL/MARCEL DUCHAMP ...IN RESONANCE (Houston: Menil
Foundation, Inc., 1998), p. 74
thirties, Calder was in Paris, making his wire portraits of Josephine Baker
and others. Clay Spohn, a very curious artist from San Francisco who was a
conceptual _bricoleur_ and who did some of the first assemblage art in
California, was also in Paris at that time, and he knew both Calder and
Duchamp. Spohn told me that he had actually been the one to suggest the idea
of the mobile to Calder. I had heard that it was Duchamp, and asked Marcel
about that. He laughed and said, "Oh, people have always misunderstood.
Spohn, this strange American whom I enjoyed very much, suggested to Calder
that he take the little parts and balance them on wires to make these
contraptions. What I did was to name it. What I invented was the word
_mobile_."
--Walter Hopps, "Gimme Strength: Joseph Cornell and Marcel Duchamp
Remembered" in JOSEPH CORNELL/MARCEL DUCHAMP ...IN RESONANCE (Houston: Menil
Foundation, Inc., 1998), p. 74