Alexander Calder's Flamingo is a 53-foot-high (16-meter-high),
50-ton (45,359-kilogram) steel sculpture that is the centerpiece
of the Federal Plaza in front of the Kluczynski Federal Building
on South Dearborn Street. It was constructed by Calder in 1973
and was unveiled in 1974. Flamingo was painted in a shade of
vermilion, which has come to be known as Calder red, in order to
offset the black steel buildings surrounding the plaza.The
artwork is a type of sculpture known as a stabile. First
pioneered by Calder, a stabile is a completely stationary
abstract sculpture that in form is similar to a mobile. The
difference is that a mobile moves with air currents.