Alexander Calder: Workshop for Kids

Children will have the opportunity to unleash their inner inventor with creativity and making at Alexander Calder: Workshop for Kids, opening 5 April 2019 at the National Gallery of Victoria. In conjunction with the exhibition, Alexander Calder: Radical Inventor, this NGV Kids installation incorporates hands-on activities for young visitors, including constructing animal sculptures and a multimedia game where they can design virtual public artworks across Melbourne.

Alexander Calder was captivated with movement and animals even as a child; at age 11 he gifted his parents with sculptures he had made of a dog and a duck. Taking direction from this fascination, Alexander Calder: Workshop for Kids presents children with the opportunity to construct their own unique creatures. Using custom-designed paper templates, children will work with intesecting shapes and folding techniques to build animal sculptures.

Just as Calder designed outdoor sculptures on a grand scale, children will be able to create public artworks in a specially designed multimedia game. Equipped with a virtual toolbox of shapes and colours, children will enrich Melbourne by designing public sculptures at popular Melbourne sites St Kilda Beach, Royal Botanical Gardens or NGV International.

Tony Ellwood AM, Director, NGV said, 'The NGV is dedicated to nurturing young creative minds through year-round programming tailored to children and families. Alexander Calder: Workshop for Kids is a participatory exhibition designed to inspire learning and art-making for visitors of all ages, while also exposing children to the work of Calder, a mid-century modernist master.'

As well as the NGV Kids exhibition, there will be almost 100 of Calder's works on display in the Alexander Calder: Radical Inventor exhibition. Spanning the artist's entire career, these works range from early childhood sculptures to avant-garde innovations to large-scale objects from the last chapter of his career in the 1970s. Organised in collaboration with the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Canada, the exhibition brings together sculpture, drawing, painting, jewellery and other media from North American art museums and private collections, including generous loans from the Calder Foundation, New York.

Alexander Calder: Workshop for Kids will be on display from 5 April – 4 August 2019 at NGV International. This exhibition is free and additional information is available via the NGV website NGV.MELBOURNE.

Alexander Calder: Radical Inventor will be on display from 5 April – 4 August 2019 at NGV International. Tickets and information are available from the NGV website NGV.MELBOURNE. Adult $22 | Concession $18 | Child (5-15 years) $10 | Family (2 adults + 3 children) $60

The NGV Kids program is generously supported by The Truby and Florence Williams Charitable Trust, managed by Equity Trustees. This grant provides crucial encouragement to the corporate and philanthropic community to support children's programming at the NGV.

The NGV warmly thanks The Truby and Florence Williams Charitable Trust, managed by Equity Trustees, the Crown Resorts and Packer Family foundations and Official Supplier, Canson Australia for their generous support of Alexander Calder: Workshop for Kids.