Antoni Milkowski

Antoni Milkowski (born 1935 – died 2001) was an American minimalist sculptor. Biography Antoni "Tony" Milkowski was born October 7, 1935 in Evanston, Illinois. He was also known as "Antek", particularly by his family. When he was two years old, the family moved to New York City. He attended Kenyon College where he received a degree in biology in 1957. For a time, he considered pursuing a career in medicine, taking additional science courses at Columbia University. Instead, in 1958, he enlisted in the United States Marine Corps Officers Candidate Program. While stationed in San Diego, California he took drawing and art history courses at the University of California, Berkeley extension program. Discharged from the Marine Corps in 1961, Milkowski returned to New York and worked for a time as a recreation leader for the NYC Parks Department. The following year, he enrolled in an M.A. program at Hunter College. He worked on and off in the Queens parks during this time and also taught at the Lost Battalion Hall Recreation Center. In 1963, while at Hunter College, Milkowski began studying with Tony Smith (sculptor), Ad Reinhardt, Michael Ponce de Leon, George Sugarman and Eugene Goossen. His interactions with these artists, in addition to his meeting David Smith (sculptor), cemented his desire to pursue sculpture. It was in 1964-1965, while a Fulbright Scholar in Poland (where he also taught at the Academy of Fine Arts in Warsaw), that Milkowski was invited to participate in the Biennial of Forms in Space, where he created his first major large-scale public work entitled "Poland Column". During this period, he began to develop his aesthetic of merging geometry and repetition, mainly in modular units and generally in steel. Over the years, he refined his methods and became interested in the concept of negative space and of the three-dimensional form in space. The sculpture Salem No. 7, from 1968, exemplifies these ideas. The piece consists of seven rectangular prisms (34"