Daniel Silver (born 1972) is an artist living in London. He was born in London and raised in Jerusalem. Silver studied at the Slade School of Art* (BA Fine Art, 1999). He received his MA in Sculpture from the Royal College of Art*, London in 2001. He went on to study sculpture in Italy at the British School in Rome in 2002. He has exhibited across the UK and internationally.

Silver's work includes sculpture, painting, drawing and installation*. His work draws from ancient sculptural archetypes and modernist sculptors, like Jacob Epstein and Henri Gaudier-Brzeska. Despite its references to figurative sculptural traditions, the former director of the Museu Nacional de Belas Artes (Rio de Janeiro) Paulo Herkenhoff described Daniel Silver’s sculpture as a “dyslexic body,” which “refuses to follow a canon, or an established grammar which builds meanings, or work in pre-mapped territory”

Silver explores and manipulates the sculptural figure in his work. As his practice has developed he has examined the physical and emotional impact of the body and its representation. He has said that he is particularly interested in the head as his subject. “The reason I make the head is, on the one hand to continue the bust-making tradition, and on the other that they are the most interesting part of the body, the most object-like part of the body.”

Silver's projects include Dig, a commission by producers, Artangel. This sculptural installation was located in Grafton Way, into a derelict site where once was located one of London's largest Odeon Cinemas. Silver presented an imagined archeological dig of sculptures looking both ancient and futuristic, conceived by the artist as a “history of sculpture”. The project is inspired by Freud’s collection of antiques, which was used by Freud as a reservoir of metaphors to interpret his patients' traumatic experiences.

Similarly, Silver is interested in the psychological and emotional dimension of sculpture and to investigate its relation with memory and history. In an interview with Ben Luke, Silver explained that "To be an archaeologist is about understanding our past through objects. I’m also trying to figure out things that are more psychological, about us as people, and objects throughout time allow me to do that.”

* For more in-depth information about these terms and others, see AskART.com. Glossary http://www.askart.com/AskART/lists/Art_Definition.aspx

Daniel Silver
1972 Born in LondonLives and works in London

EDUCATION
1999-2000
MA Fine Art Sculpture, Royal College of Art, London

1995-1999
BA (hons) Fine Art, Slade School of Fine Art, University College London

SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2019
The New Art Gallery, Walsall (Forthcoming)

2018
Daniel Silver, Frith Street Gallery, London

2015
Rock Formations, Art Basel Parcours, Antikenmuseum, Basel
Rock Formations, Frith Street Gallery, London
Roundabout Mouth, OMR Gallery, Mexico City

2013
Dig, Artangel, London

2012
Museo Carlo Zauli, Faenza
Galleria Suzy Shammah, Milan

2011
Letting Go, AMP, Athens
Coming Together, Kunsthaus Glarus, Glarus

2010
The Smoking Silver Father Figures, Frieze Sculpture Park, London

2009
Solo Show, Frieze Art Fair, London, UK
Cabinets #4: Daniel Silver, SE8, London, UK
Lionz in Zion, Galleria Suzy Shammah, Milan, Italy

2008
Making Something Your Own, IBID PROJECTS, London
The Monks, Ancient & Modern, London

2007
Heads, Camden Arts Centre, London
Demos, Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art, Sunderland

2006
Daniel Silver, Galleria Suzy Shammah, Milan, Italy

2005
Daniel Silver, Pescali & Sprovieri Gallery, London

2003
Pailot Project, Gropiusstat, Berlin, Germany
The Buddha and the Chaise Longue, Tal Esther Gallery, Tel-Aviv, Israel

2001
Cake Snake, Sprovieri Gallery, London

1998
Galleri s.e, Bergen, Norway