Pangolin London, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9AG
www.pangolinlondon.com Instagram: @pangolin.london
Pangolin London is unusual in being a gallery specialising in sculpture, and in being connected with a leading foundry – Pangolin Editions, started in 1985 by Rungwe Kingdon and Claude Koenig. Consequently, much of what you see on show is a product of the artists in collaboration with the broader business in Gloucestershire. King’s Place, which also hosts a wide programme of music and drama, is a large and impressive building, giving the gallery the chance to expand beyond its dedicated space. There are window displays, a sculpture trail inside and outside the building, and usually a second exhibition on the lower levels (though that cannot always be viewed, due to conference events). When Pangolin London opened in 2008, the director was Polly Bielecka – and it still is. She has overseen a well-catalogued programme that mixes solo presentations with group shows – I recall the particularly extensive display of sculptors’ drawings in 2021. You can currently catch a wide range of creatures in the entertaining ‘Animal Instincts’. That includes Breon O’Casey’s homage to the rarely-foregrounded slug, as well as Pangolin Design’s own life-size bronze of… a pangolin. Thinking back across solo shows in recent years, I recall William Tucker, Susie MacMurray and Eilis O’Connell as highlights – together with regular shows by the Danish ceramic sculptor Merete Rasmussen, and works from across the whole of Lynn Chadwick’s career. Next up will be Geoffrey Clarke (1924-2014): my image shows the neatly geometric take on Cerberus that you can see at the moment – it’s by Geoffrey’s son, Jonathan, also an established sculptor.
London’s gallery scene is varied, from small artist-run spaces to major institutions and everything in between. Each week, art writer and curator Paul Carey-Kent gives a personal view of a space worth visiting.
