Silver is a wonderful material. It is malleable enough for easy working, yet strong, stable and hard enough for regular handling. It is a clean material to work with and has a beautiful colour - that subtle, slightly creamy white. Its surface is both beautiful when polished bright or when taken to a soft, unreflective finish more suitable to the contemporary home.
Millar’s designs use these properties of surface and reflection, cool and warm, shade and shadow, allowing the forms to show or conceal their edges with various surface finishes, and to play construction games of balance and connection, of weight and apparent lightness. The function of pieces is also important to him, and most of his current work is intended to be used and give pleasure on a regular basis.
Millar is attracted also to other materials with other working properties, for colour and texture contrasts and for practical purposes, too. Together with chemically-patinated copper and brass, shaped semi-precious stones and synthetic industrial materials are used regularly as decorative and tactile elements to work against the silver. |