Dastan is pleased to announce its inaugural participation at Frieze Sculpture 2025 with “Neighbours”, a large-scale outdoor sculpture by Abdollah Nafisi (b. 1982), presented at Regent’s Park, London. On public view from September 18 through October 19, 2025, the work considers the paradoxes of selfhood and presence, exploring how identity is shaped through both material and immaterial forces. This edition of Frieze Sculpture is curated by Fatoş Üstek, one of the most respected curators and writers working in promoting art and artistic projects in the public realm.
Constructed from salvaged steel and painted in acrylic polyurethane, “Neighbours” stretches across 4.4 meters, with two horn-like arms extending in opposing directions. One side anchors weight, memory, and material accumulation, while the other channels air, light, and the fleeting moments. Between them, a suspended yellow vessel hangs in balance, poised between stability and release. The open structure engages its environment, amplifying wind, breath, and subtle shifts in sound, transforming absence into presence.
Nafisi’s practice draws from his background in Japanese-style woodworking, high-end furniture making, and his experiences with nomadic tribes in Iran, where movement and connection shape a sense of belonging. His sculptures often function as meeting points between forms, highlighting the negative spaces they create. In “Neighbours”, this relational dimension becomes an immersive encounter, as visitors step into the space between the horns and experience the shifting resonance of air and sound. “This work is not a static object; it is a space of transition, a moment of resonance,” the artist notes.
At its core, the work embodies a philosophical inquiry into balance: how the self is defined both by what is held and what is released, by the solid and the void. The sculpture resists closure, leaving space for the viewer to complete it, becoming part of its dialogue between materiality and perception. Echoing parables of misplaced investment and philosophical notions of identity in flux, “Neighbours” suggests that clarity emerges not through possession, but through attunement to what passes through us.
Situated within the landscape of London’s Regent’s Park, “Neighbours” responds directly to its surroundings. As light and shadow shift across the day, the sculpture alters in perception, underscoring its central theme of transition. The work serves as both medium and threshold: an interface between the external world and the inner self, where presence is felt as much as seen.
