This abstract sculpture, known as a mobile, turns more than 400 pounds of metal into a delicate cascade in perpetual motion. Animated by the airflows of the terminal, it changes form constantly, like leaves on a tree or planets in orbit. Calder made the work to hang above the grand staircase of the Carnegie Museum, which wanted it to look “like a tremendous chandelier in an opera house.” It won first prize for sculpture at the museum’s 41st International exhibition in 1958. Pittsburgh art collector and industrialist G. David Thompson bought and donated the work to the airport as a memorial to his late son. First installed in the 1952 terminal above a terrazzo compass rose, the stable directional coordinates on the floor contrasted with the work’s multi-directional aerial flows. It was also infamously repainted without the artist’s permission – first in yellow and green, and then in a pinkish red – but restored to its original color in 1979. After more than thirty years at the top of the escalators in the 1992 terminal, Calder’s Pittsburgh was relocated to this atrium on August 21, 2025.

– Dr. Alex J. Taylor, University of Pittsburgh
 

Materials: Painted Aluminum, Steel
Location: Atrium, Pre-security Terminal
Type: Sculpture