BIO

Sabina Silver is a Ghanaian British visual artist based in London. Working primarily in acrylic, oil pastel, soft pastel and pigment ink, she creates figurative paintings that explore memory, migration and the psychological landscapes shaped by race, gender and belonging.

Her practice began as a way of understanding her own experience of becoming selectively mute after moving from Ghana to the UK. Through portraiture, she examines how lived experience settles into the body, exploring the tensions between visibility and invisibility, hope and anxiety, resilience and vulnerability.

Alongside her studio practice, she facilitates workshops with institutions including Nike, the National Gallery and OSCAM Amsterdam.

ARTIST STATEMENT

My paintings explore the emotional and psychological conditions that shape how we move through the world.

Working from everyday observations and lived experience, I use figurative painting to examine how memory, migration and identity are carried within the body. I am interested in emotional contradictions and the ways seemingly opposing feelings can exist at once, where hope can coexist with anxiety, belonging with displacement, and strength with vulnerability.

Colour plays a central role in my practice, particularly red, which has evolved from a formal element into a symbolic language that carries memory, presence and emotional weight. Rather than offering fixed narratives, my paintings create space for reflection, inviting viewers to consider the experiences that shape both our inner lives and our relationships with others.

As my practice develops, I am expanding into research led and interdisciplinary ways of working while continuing to use painting as my primary means of inquiry.