Nicholas Milkovich is an emerging American installation sculptor based in Brooklyn. He is also a mechanical engineer with research in soft-tissue biomechanics. He draws inspiration from biological features found in the human body to create installations meant to invade spaces. Using colorful synthetic materials and repeated form, Milkovich generates work that balances between deadly serious and whimsical.
The human body is a perfectly fabricated machine made up of nature’s most clever designs. Specifically, all things in biology are made of networks of smaller microstructures: atoms, cells, and limbs are units that interconnect to form meshworks of utility. Connection and configuration dictates the characteristics of the macrostructure. In Milkovich’s installations, he mimics biological motifs in an effort to both overwhelm and control processes otherwise left passive. Calling attention to these features can have the added effect of eliciting the uncanny. He uses this register to express feelings of bodily “wrongness”, both physical and internal. He also counteracts that feeling with his own enthusiasm for the body’s complex structure through color and a wide variety of materials.
Milkovich has taught Sculpture at his alma mater, MassArt. He has also participated in other artist residencies such as Radio28 Creative Studios (Mexico City, Mexico) and MERZ Gallery (Sanquhar, Scotland). Milkovich published his biomechanical research in peer-reviewed journals such as Frontiers: Bioengineering & Biotechnology and The Laryngoscope.
milkovichsculpture.com
Nicholas Milkovich’s residency is made possible through AAI’s ongoing partnership with Residency Unlimited.