"Painting is the silence that surrounds the sound of poetry."
- Steve Silver
Steve Silver, a Brooklyn-based artist (b. Bronx 1947), began his career writing poetry. After studying in Universidad Ibero-Americana in Mexico City and Adelphi University in New York, Steve taught in the English Department at Hofstra on Long Island and acted as a visiting artist at Escola Massana in Barcelona.
In 1977, while hitchhiking from Mexico City to Lima, Silver had an epiphany riding atop a coal truck, a realization that he was going to become a painter.
Silver’s background as a poet and his affinity for language manifest in both the content and form of his visual expression. Da Vinci's dictum, "Painting is poetry that is seen rather than felt," underlies Steve's work. Words, letters and numbers often appear in his work. The titles of his pieces are sometimes small poems themselves or lines from writers like Yeats, Melville, Stevens and Cavafy. "Painting," Silver said, "is the silence that surrounds the sound of poetry."
Silver's exuberant use of color and interference acrylic reflects a sense of awe of the world and its uncertainty. Reminiscent of ideas explored by a diverse group of artists including Lita Albuqurque, Robert Irwin, Larry Bell, Barnett Newman and David Smith, Silver’s practice often relies on one’s physical perspective and perception of light. The ever-shifting appearance of his artwork underscores the conditionality of art and its contingence on human senses.
Steve likes to paint found objects, for example, some of his latest sculptures are rusted scaffolding connectors placed on 3-foot painted planks resting on 4-inch red orange casters.
He was first exhibited at Ivan Karp's OK Harris Gallery and has had exhibitions in Mexico, Germany and Spain. His work has been represented by galleries in Art Cologne, Art Miami, and Kunstmarkt Dresden where it was featured by Galerie Michael Beck alongside Pablo Picasso.