© Gibbs Farm 2013
Rickey has very successfully combined engineering with the aesthetic and is one of the few artists who have managed to weld them together into an inseparable synthesis.
This elegant work never appears to repeat itself in its response to the wind. The two large rectangles, which move independently and each rotate on a single axis, are nudged into action by even the most subtle breezes.
George Rickey was born in South Bend, Indiana on June 6, 1907 and died on July 17, 2002. First studying at Balliol College in Oxford and then in Paris during the 1920s, Rickey was inspired by Alexander Calder's oeuvre; and following his discharge from the Army in the 1940s studied at New York University Institute of Fine Arts and the
Chicago Institute of Design. His life work included numerous solo exhibitions and public art commissions in America, Europe and Japan. All his mobiles and kinetic sculptures perform their movements without any motor power, using instead the laws of nature, wind power and gravity. The artist’s honours included a DAAD scholarship in
1968-69 for a residency in Berlin; in 1987 he was awarded membership to the Akademie der Künste in Berlin; and in 1999 he received a Lifetime Achievement in Contemporary Sculpture Award from the International Sculpture Center in America.
Two Rectangles, Vertical
Gyratory Up (V)

1987
Stainless steel
3.5 – 8.13 x 12.14m

George Rickey

ARTWORK ONE
ARTWORK TWO

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