Daniel Silver
Frith Street Gallery – Golden Square
14 September 2018 – 3 November 2018
We hadn’t planned to visit this exhibition—we came across it by chance. Yet it proved such an unexpected pleasure that it felt worth revisiting here, even retrospectively.
Upon entering Frith Street Gallery in Golden Square, we encountered the first part of the exhibition: an installation of five sculptures evoking herm-like forms (a herm being a squared stone pillar topped with a carved head, traditionally used in ancient Greece as a boundary marker). Carved in marble and onyx from the stone yards of Serravezza and Pietrasanta, these figures appeared at once classical and curiously contemporary. Dressed like mannequins, their still, armless bodies recalled Rodin’s Monument to Balzac. Surrounded by them, one became acutely aware of the luxury of their materials—especially the marble—and of the contemplative stillness their poses offered.
Moving further into the gallery, the earlier sense of quietude shifted into a more dynamic, exuberant atmosphere. The main space was filled with mannequins produced by Rootstein, the world’s leading manufacturer. Cast in plastic and predominantly white—as if their colour had faded to leave only faint traces of blue and brown—they appeared mid-dance or mid-exercise, reminiscent of Degas’ Young Spartans Exercising. Their human scale made the room feel like an invitation: a moment in which one might step in and join their choreography.
To connect these two groups of figures, the exhibition also featured a series of wall hangings composed of fabric cut-outs. Created by Silver while observing a dancer in his studio, these shapes became abstract responses to a body moving in time and space.
The exhibition extended into Frith Street Gallery’s Soho Square space, though we were unable to visit that section on the same day. According to the gallery, that part of the show shifted to a smaller scale, with works carved in marble or modelled in clay, some displayed on top of a draped fabric-covered table.
Daniel Silver is a London-based artist best known for his figurative sculptures. His practice is deeply influenced by ancient Greek art, Modernist sculpture, and Freudian psychoanalytic theory. Working with materials such as concrete, bronze, marble, stone, wood and clay, Silver’s works often appear as monuments or totems, as if unearthed from an archaeological excavation. His figures speak of the intimacy of touch and the memories inherited through material. Exploring and manipulating the human figure—sometimes with brutality, at other times with great sensitivity—Silver moves between styles like an analyst and an archaeologist, examining the physical and emotional impact of the body and its representation.
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