London Sculpture Week 2025

This September, London Sculpture Week returns with a city-wide celebration of public art, placing works in dialogue with the fabric of London itself. From Trafalgar Square to the East Bank, the week invites us to rediscover London through sculpture’s ability to reshape how we move, see, and gather.

For followers of Materially Speaking, London Sculpture Week resonates with Pietrasanta, the Tuscan town often described as the international home of sculpture. Pietrasanta’s marble workshops have long drawn artists from across the globe, offering a place where stone, bronze, and found materials are not only worked, but honoured. London’s programme echoes this emphasis on materiality and craftsmanship.

Ai Weiwei’s Roots: Palace, cast in iron from Brazilian tree trunks, transforms organic form into an enduring monument. Oliver Bragg’s bench plaques, quietly integrated into the city, remind us of the tactile intimacy of relief carving. Teresa Margolles’ Mil Veces un Instante (A Thousand Times in an Instant), composed of hundreds of facial casts from trans, non-binary, and gender non-conforming people, transforms public space into a site of remembrance and collective presence, highlighting sculpture’s power to give voice and visibility to communities.

London Sculpture Week, like Pietrasanta, insists on sculpture’s role beyond the gallery: as shared heritage, civic identity, and a medium for joy, reflection, and belonging. Together, they remind us that material carries a story — and that story, in the right hands, belongs to us all.