Whispering Silence - Marnie Weber - Private view 9 May, 6-9 PM

Aug 28, 2026

Uploaded by Aurelia

Whispering Silence presents Marnie Weber’s first solo UK exhibition since 2009, tracing two decades of film, painting, collage, and sculpture. Centered on House of the Whispering Rose (2025) and The Sea of Silence (2009), the show examines feminine identity, mortality, and the supernatural by blending memory with fantasy. Across dreamlike spaces, characters and spectral figures blur life and death, while paintings and sculptures anchor the work in place, nature, and the enduring legacy of surrealism.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryStory & Novel

FormatPDF

Pages2

Reading Time3 min

AccessFree to download

Whispering Silence

House of the Whispering Rose (2025)

The Sea of Silence (2009)

Spirit Girls and Truth Speakers

Sculpture, collage, and related works

Artist representation and venue information

Whispering Silence Marnie Weber Curated by Phoebe Ahern 10 May-7 June 2025 Private view: 9 May, 6-9 PM Inspection Pit, East Harting, West Sussex, GU31 5LZ Whispering Silence marks Marnie Weber’s return to the UK with her first solo exhibition since 2009. Bringing together film, painting, collage, and sculpture, the show surveys two decades of the artist’s practice. At its centre are two key films—House of the Whispering Rose (2025) and The Sea of Silence (2009)—through which Weber continues her exploration of feminine identity, mortality, and the supernatural. Blurring the boundaries between life and death, memory and fantasy, her work conjures a world rich in theatricality and mysticism, where women inhabit dreamlike spaces of longing, resistance, and transformation. House of the Whispering Rose (2025) explores themes of fading relevance, solitude, and decline through the poignant narrative of Rose Bloom, an ageing silent film starlet living alone in an abandoned mansion. Haunted by visions of her youthful self, she clings to the remnants of a lost career, her isolation giving rise to hallucinatory companions. These surreal episodes flicker between memory and fantasy, grief and awakening, reflecting on deterioration and the possibility of renewal. A flashback scene captures Rose’s thwarted transition from stage to screen, deepening her sense of loss. As spring approaches and time moves forward, the film paints a complex portrait of a woman caught between the past and the uncertain future, navigating her own evolution and rebirth. The series of oil paintings on paper, conceived as Rose’s own, fuse film and fantasy. Set against the rolling backdrop of the South Downs and the grounds of Inspection Pit, the paintings tether Rose, and the work itself, to nature, place, and the enduring legacy of surrealism that permeates the Sussex landscape. The work speaks to the psychology of an ageing artist, for whom painting becomes an act of conjuring and quiet resistance. Moth Girl with Sheep (2025) presents a young woman, moth-winged and barefoot, standing beside a ewe and her lambs. Her gaze dissolves the margins between human, animal, and spirit, as though she belongs to the land itself. The moth, a recurring motif in Weber’s practice, symbolises both death and metamorphosis: a fragile yet persistent creature drawn to light, a delicate emblem of hope emerging from darkness. The scene feels oddly familiar, evoking a time we can never quite place, a lingering sense of presence where the real and imagined momentarily converge. The Sea of Silence (2009) introduces the Spirit Girls, spectral figures suspended between life and death who seek to reclaim their voice. In the film, they encounter the Truth Speakers, a group of ventriloquist dolls through whom they hope to communicate with the living. Once granted speech, the girls deliver a performance that oscillates between philosophical reflections on truth, beauty, and silence, and crude, absurdist humour. This uneasy interplay between voice and body, presence and absence, draws on the ancient roots of ventriloquism, once viewed not only as entertainment but as a mystical act of summoning voices from within or beyond. The Spirit Girls are part of a broader conceptual, multidisciplinary project by the artist that explores feminine identity, memory, and the supernatural. Portrayed as an all-female band who died tragically in the 1970s, they return in ghostly form, unseen and unheard by the living, except for the animals who remain attuned to their presence. Through sculpture, film, collage, and performance, Weber constructs a world where these apparitions function as conduits of lost narratives, channelling both personal and collective memory. In The Sea of Silence (2009) , their voices rise only to reveal that silence, in the end, may be their most powerful form of expression. Sculptures and collages of the Spirit Girls, the Truth Speakers, and their animal companions cre

FAQs

What is the main focus of the exhibition Whispering Silence?

The exhibition focuses on Marnie Weber’s return to the UK and brings together film, painting, collage, and sculpture to survey two decades of her practice.

Which two key films anchor the show?

House of the Whispering Rose (2025) and The Sea of Silence (2009) are the central films.

How do the Spirit Girls function within The Sea of Silence (2009)?

The Spirit Girls are spectral figures between life and death who seek to reclaim their voice through encounters with the Truth Speakers, ventriloquist dolls.

Aug 28, 2026

Uploaded by Aurelia