Pedro de Movellan American, 1967

“The sculpture is one of the best mediums for me to communicate a sense or feeling that cannot be put into words. The combination of balance, movement, colour, and shape are the portal for expression."
Pedro S. De Movellán developed his mastery of kinetic art through several influences. The child of an architect father and painter mother, De Movellán was raised in a home where artistic expression and technical knowledge were highly encouraged. Despite early memories of building and deconstructing all manner of machines, clocks, toys, and devices as a child, it was at university that De Movellán’s career changed.
 
Originally intending to study engineering and design, he was struck by the sculpture of Alexander Calder and George Rickey and fascinated by the ever-changing aspects of their work. Before dedicating his time fully to art, De Movellán channeled his creative drive into making custom-made furniture and boat-building, drawing formal and technical inspirations that would continue to influence his work for decades.
 
De Movellán is most certainly a kinetic sculpture, accepting the mantle from his predecessors while pushing the boundaries of what is capable. While scale, form, and color are key components of virtually all sculpture, it is De Movellán’s ability with motion that sets him apart. For that, he relies heavily on technical expertise and instinct, but finds visual and theoretical cues in nature: trees, birds, and even the weather, but also to mathematics, engineering, fluid dynamics. The connection to air and wind is perhaps the most obvious as almost all of his work is driven by wind, but the visualization of air – and of objects moving in, with, and because of it – become one of De Movellán’s singular gifts.