The emergence of Richard Stankiewicz (1922-1983) as a leading sculptor in the early 1950s represented a pivotal aesthetic choice within the emerging second generation of the New York School. His dedication to constructing works from junk materials of city origin, particularly his reliance on “rusty found-metal sculptures”, was one of the critical paths taken by younger artists seeking to confront “visual reality or ‘life'” while departing from the predominantly abstract focus of their predecessors. This new approach, which came to be called assemblage, allowed artists to retain the raw, energetic aesthetic or the “gestural ‘look'” of Abstract Expressionism while embedding their work firmly in the textures of the urban environment.

Untitled, early 1950s, metal sculpture, 106x64x34 cm

Stankiewicz’s definitive commitment to scrap metal was inspired by a sudden revelation in the winter of 1951–52. While attempting to dig a garden in the courtyard of his studio building, he unearthed discarded iron. He recalled sitting down, his glance falling on the rusty pieces: “Their sense of presence, of life, was almost overpowering. I knew instantly what I had to do.”(1) This moment spurred him to immediately purchase welding equipment, and his first sculpture was finished in a day.
An early example of this initial phase is the Untitled metal sculpture (early 1950s). This piece, marked by a metal plate on its wooden base reading “Richard Stankiewicz New York”, clearly demonstrates his foundational engagement with urban detritus as a sculptural medium.
Despite having received significant training—including studies with Hans Hofmann and later with Ossip Zadkine and Fernand Léger—Stankiewicz’s approach aligned him with the spontaneous spirit of the New York School. His process of working with these materials was akin to gesture painting, allowing for a “dialogue between myself and the work,” as he described in 1955. His methodology was deeply intuitive; he later insisted that he did not wait for formal inspiration: “You keep working and when you’ve got your tools in your hands, the ideas will come.”.
For Stankiewicz, the act of creation was highly improvisational, requiring both intensity and flexibility. He acknowledged that nearly none of his work was “premeditated or planned out”, often working in a “state of panic” until the first move dictated the sculpture’s path. He consciously avoided imposing extraneous ideas or rigid formulae, believing that the best part of an artist’s work is unconscious. This dedication to process also informed his rejection of certain academic practices; he explicitly stated his opposition to the idea of teaching “design,” asserting that the “freight determines the form”.

Stankiewicz used the discarded, humble materials—what was called “the mud of this civilization”—to create works that evoked the urban spectacle, suggesting metaphors for the “poverty and the richness of city life, its terror and anxiety”. Assemblage-makers like Stankiewicz ignored the “clean ‘modern’ design” of the International Style, preferring “what is broken, cast off, rubbishy, awkward, ugly and rusty… [putting] least things first.”(2)
In his earliest shows, beginning in 1953, he established a highly imaginative figurative style, often described as Surrealist in its bizarreness. Critics noted the “witty relationship between the mechanical and the human”. He coined descriptive terms for these inventions, calling them: “Ghoulish buggy creepers, erect starers, careening exerters, floating fliers, squatting blocky ones.”(3). An exemplary piece is Secretary (1955), which uses a wrecked typewriter embedded in a cast-off boiler. At times, the quest for a working idea led him toward conceptual structures, such as a productive phase where he explored letters of the alphabet, resulting in six or eight successful large “C” sculptures made from angle irons and tubing segments.
When his choice of materials drew hostility—with assemblage often dismissed as an “anti-art joke” and derisively labeled “Neo-Dada”—Stankiewicz strongly defended his meticulous methodology. Challenged at a panel in 1955, he insisted: “I am not Dada. I don’t want to shock anyone. It is natural for me to do and use what I do… I select very carefully. Nothing happens that I don’t want to happen.”(4) This defense underscored the rigorous artistic intention behind his choice of seemingly random junk.

While figurative elements persisted into the early 1960s, Stankiewicz’s output became “increasingly abstract toward the end of the decade, as if to focus attention on formal values”. This critical shift away from the rough, narrative scrap was cemented by an unexpected experience in 1969.
While visiting Australia, Stankiewicz found himself committed to a show but only had access to industrial “mill materials: I-beams, angle irons, steel tubing—stock shapes which were very straight, very geometric, very regular”. This was “antithetic to the rough junk, aesthetic” of his previous work. Forced to adapt, he produced sixteen pieces which looked very different from what had gone before, leading to a profound “refinement and an economy in the number of elements”.
The work produced after 1969, including pieces from the early 1970s, constituted a direct continuation of this “Australian development”. An example of this formal rigor is a Corten steel sculpture from our collection, 1971-9 from 1971 (see the images below). These simpler, more geometric forms—where the structuring of shapes took precedence over recognizable images—were exemplified by very large-scale pieces. For instance, the 13-foot Number 2 sculpture (early ’70s), composed of a large cylinder and angle iron on a cubicle pedestal, resulted from a conscious decision to re-execute an earlier idea on a size that would be “really frightening,” based on spectator feedback. This later, rigorous formal design confirmed the lasting aesthetic value of his work, demonstrating that his use of detritus was ultimately transcended by his engagement with “fundamental problems” of sculpture.

detail of the exhibition poster, Richard Stankiewicz, Zabriskie Gallery, New York, 4 – 29 April 1972

right side, 1971-9, 1971, Corten steel, 101,5 x 51 x 56 cm

left side, 1971-9, 1971, Corten steel, 101,5 x 51 x 56 cm