In Yale’s Hewitt Quadrangle, the vivid colors of Alexander Calder’s monumental 1960 sculpture Gallows and Lollipops sing against the grays and blues of buildings and sky, swaying and spinning in the breeze, and drawing the attention of people passing through the plaza. But it will soon be missed in its accustomed site when the sculpture is removed for conservation on Thursday.
The treatment will be overseen by the Yale University Art Gallery, in whose collection the sculpture belongs. Mark Mitchell, the Gallery’s Holcombe T. Green Curator of American Paintings and Sculpture, said, “Conservation involves assessing and repairing wear on an object, including the natural erosion that occurs as paint and metal are exposed to the elements. It’s also a time to assess how best to present an object going forward with respect to its purpose and condition.”
Although Gallows and Lollipops is not expected to return to the Quadrangle, the sculpture has had an auspicious tenure at Yale. The sculpture was given to the university by anonymous donors in 1975, a year before Calder’s death. This will be the second time Gallows and Lollipops has left Hewitt Quadrangle recently, as it was moved to the sculpture garden at the Yale University Art Gallery in 2017 during the Yale Schwarzman Center (YSC) renovation. The sculpture was reinstalled in the Quadrangle in September 2021.
The Quadrangle’s changing configuration is a topic of both social and academic interest for its neighbors at YSC. The Center’s Associate Artistic Director Jennifer Harrison Newman said, “The conservation of the Calder offers us an extraordinary opportunity to consider space, memory, and the nature of monuments. YSC is looking forward to hosting a series of conversations around this with our community of artists and scholars.”
Those conversations, Newman said, will likely take the form of YSC Sessions, which are the Center’s peer-led gatherings designed to engage small groups over a meal. Each group of Session participants, or “Sessionists” as YSC calls them, include Yale students, faculty, staff, and New Haven residents. YSC Sessions are announced through the YSC website, newsletter, and Yale University events calendar.
