Behind the Golden Exterior
The 21st Century's answer to King Midas. Bournemouth's very own maverick human statue, John Ball
Someone ought to stop that man he’s scaring the bloody life out of me,” proclaims one victim of the gold-man’s outstretching hand. “He’s brilliant, I’ve been here for three hours watching him,” a woman whispers to her friend. Some people pass by not noticing him at all.
To say that it took £2.65 just to speak to John would be no word of a lie. Imagine a frantic teenager flailing desperately in front of a man stood as still as, well... a statue, and a golden one at that, trying to get his attention for an interview. This was me. Realising the only way to loosen his lips was to cast any remaining change into his pot of glimmering gold, money was shed and the transaction acknowledged by a modest nod.
How do you spot a human statue out of his ‘work clothes’? No longer recognisable by their regular apparel, how would you know what he or she looked like? John Ball or Johnny Silverman, as he likes to be known, has endless curls of receding shale hair, strongly defined cheek bones and weathered face. He stands at six-foot-one minus the two-inch heel of his boot, originally from Merseyside, Liverpool, he is one of four sons and three daughters. Working as a human statue, he currently is a golden-man, remaining still but making little movements to make people smile, laugh and quite often jump. Despite only working for three hours a day, six days of the week he accumulates approximately £280-350.
“I hope you don’t mind me doing this,” he says rolling a cigarette sprinkling small amounts of cannabis into the roll leading me to where he changes, “but you aren’t going to interfere with my day when that’s who I am.” John Ball is someone so relaxed that you worry he’d forget to breathe at times, this probably is due to the drugs but aside from that he gives off an aura of calmness. 
His changing room is down a back-alley, in the loading bay for several food stores. There is a slightly raised platform on which he sits, the stones are cracked and litter is in abundance. The platform is no bigger than the average one bedroom flat and two big yellowy-white doors are behind. In the corner you can see an abandoned mini-fridge with what looks like the words Bramha on the side, with a Yellow Pages telephone directory, gold make-up and a burgundy cushion with crevices in it, all of these objects are vital when becoming gold-man. This is John’s dressing room, “bits of me are everywhere here” he says, pointing to an empty spray-paint can and pieces of gold-covered sponge.
“Gold-man, silver-man, black-man, green-man, I can do anything. I’ve got a good wardrobe in my head.
All it takes is a can of spray paint and some make-up and John Ball transforms into whoever he wants to be, "I can think who do you want to be today?”
It feels like a roaring fire would have been more of an apt location for John’s stories, his nearly black eyes light up, accompanied by hand gestures to illustrate every word he utters.
While most people were heading into the world of work or continuing onto sixth form John went backpacking, Torquay, Munich, Bordeaux; handing out flyers, cleaning rooms, doing whatever he could to earn enough for another night in the hostel.
Twenty-seven-years old and in San Francisco, it was John versus the world, “I had a fuck-you mentality until then, I needed a change, I got bored of doing the same old thing.”
John became obsessed by spirituality and Buddhism, giving up alcohol, caffeine, sugar, cigarettes, meat and went celibate, which he maintained for five years; his life consisted of meditation, working out and tai-chi. Intrigued with Tarot from an early age he went to get a reading.
“You’re a maverick,’ I always remember that, ‘you’re more likely to run a red light then to stop’ the palm-reader told me"
Four years on, he had moved on to Los Angeles, where he met George, a fellow traveller from Germany, over a game of backgammon, “I’m a gold-man, I sit down and make lots of money on the side of Venice beach, why don’t you do it?” John was ready to leave for Las Vegas but decided to stick around to “see how it went.” The two worked three-hours a day together making the equivalent of £80, George sat down in gold and John stood up recreating yoga and Tai Chi positions in silver. Still intent on travelling to Sin City he left, but returned five-months later to find George still doing the same act on Venice beach and they continued their double-act before parting company for a second time.
Honalulu, New York, Sai Kung and Bournemouth, John never stays anywhere for too long, “when travelling you come across different situations, people, places unlike stopping here all your life.” John is set to leave for Pattaya, Thailand on December 3rd.
John has been performing his characters for sixteen years now, he is 48 now but believes he has only just started on his path being a human statue “there’s still so much left for me to do, I am only at the beginning.”
The characters he portrays are a projection of himself, every time he gets into character he recollects the beginning of silver-man with George and thinks of how he changed from the boy with the ‘fuck you mentality’ to the person he is today. He sometimes struggles to remember how he started with silver-man but relishes that, “at least we have another problem and we can attack that and make money from it,” he explains.
“It’s another bow to my string,” he intentionally says it that way round, because that is John Ball, different, a maverick."
