Antony Gormley sculpture quietly removed and sold off by UK council

Kent County Council, run by Reform, removed Antony Gormley’s early public sculpture Two Stones (1979–81) from outside the Kent History and Library Centre in Maidstone and sold it back to the artist for an undisclosed sum. Green Party councillor Stuart Jeffery said the work “disappeared” during the week beginning 6 April, and the council later confirmed a private sale, citing severe financial pressures and a budget deficit. Commissioned in 1979 by Kent County Council and Arts Council England while Gormley taught at Maidstone College of Art, the piece is described by ArtUK as an eight-ton Scottish granite boulder paired with a bronze-and-concrete replica; it was relocated to Maidstone in 2013 after vandalism at a prior site in Ashford. The work was valued at £859,000 in the council’s 2024/25 accounts, but the sale price was withheld due to a confidentiality clause, and Gormley declined to comment.

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