Gary Milek
For Vermont Artist Gary Milek, painting has always be part of life.
As a child he knew that he wanted to be a professional artist. Born
in 1941 into a farming family in Glastonbury, Connecticut, Gary has
retained his farming roots. He now lives in Windsor, Vermont, where
he and his wife, Sarah, a nationally known gardener and herbalist,
established Cider Hill Gardens & Gallery.
At a young age he began studying art at the Wadsworth Athenaeum Museum in Hartford, Connecticut, and received an art scholarship to Syracuse University. He attended the Boston Museum School of Art and obtained a grant to study painting in Holland at Rijks Academy, at the famed Rijksmuseum Amsterdam, the largest museum in the Netherlands. It was there that he became acquainted with the 15th century techniques of preparing gesso panels, egg tempera mediums, and guilding with gold leaf.
After two years in Amsterdam, spent studying and copying the works of the old master painters, Milek returned to New York City- during the 1960's, a time when abstract art was at its peak and most artists were painting in imitation of the New York School. Influenced by these trends, he painted in oils in the expressionist style, but unfulfilled, he returned to nature for his inspiration and themes. It was at that point in his career that he chose egg tempera as his medium and moved to northern New England to paint his passion. Milek taught drawing and painting at Dartmouth College, in Hanover, New Hampshire, for seventeen years before retiring to paint full time from his studio in Windsor, Vermont.
Yellow Apple in the Rock Garden
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Forest Floor
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Summer Brook
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Migration over Golden Fields
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Misty Mountain
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Moving Water
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Farm Road Through Golden Fields
39" x 56"
Egg Tempera and Gold Leaf
Red Maples Triptych
16" x 38"
Egg Tempera