Painter and draftsman George Rickey began sculpting relatively late. Inspired by the early sculptures of  Alexander Calder, Rickey quickly became one of the most important  representatives of kinetic art. His often large, but always filigree  stainless steel sculptures stand out for their precise, sober and  laconic formal language. Rickey constructs fine curved or geometrically  rectangular lines and surfaces in a precisely balanced relationship to  one another in such a way that there is never anything completely random  or disorganised about the individual movements at the joints of the  elements. Rickey’s sculptures rather reveal a harmonious choreography,  which not only plays with the work's own appearance, but also gains  power from the contrast between material, form, size and an apparent  lightness, even weightlessness of movement. Rickey describes his  fascination with the movement triggered primarily by the air, the  vitality and temporality of it, but also its special aesthetic quality,  as follows: "The types of movement available to me  are, for the most part, observed every day in our natural environment.  In clouds, the sea, falling leaves, blowing grass, sails, soaring birds  and flying fish, slamming doors and shutters, hurricanes, whirlwinds and  sandstorms, sometimes silent, sometimes shuddering or roaring,  sometimes as music and sounds streaming through lips, reeds or pipes,  the air moves on." Moreover, Rickey's works succeed in  integrating the space surrounding them into their play of movement and  thus redefine it, for the viewer's perception of the space is now only  possible in relation to the interaction with Rickey's sculpture. This  way, Rickey not only anticipates contemporary developments such as  minimal or concept art, but already refers to later time-based and  virtual art forms. Works by George Rickey, who participated  in the documenta several times, can be found in many public places and  in numerous museum collections around the world.