Fox Garden at the South London Gallery. Photo: Andy Stagg
At the SLG, we recognise the role that arts organisations, especially in the Global North, have played in the climate emergency. The impact that international travel, shipping artworks, and the use of energy and materials have on our climate are impossible to ignore.
We review our environmental actions, policies, and carbon footprint on an annual basis. We report our emissions to Julie’s Bicycle and the Gallery Climate Coalition to keep track of our progress. We regularly examine our systems and programmes, learning and adapting as we go, and use data to guide our decisions. To learn more about our environmental work, read our full statement online.
As we explore new ways to reduce our impact as both individuals and an organisation, we wanted to share five key actions we’re taking to reduce our carbon footprint and make a difference:
1. Shipping Artworks More Responsibly
For our upcoming Leonardo Drew exhibition in Summer 2025, we’ll be shipping the artworks using sea freight with Crozier instead of flying them from the US. The difference in carbon emissions is very significant, and we’re excited to make this more sustainable shift.
In a case study by Gallery Climate Coalition and Cadogan Tate, they found that choosing ocean transport to move artworks resulted in a carbon footprint 96% lower than if air freight had been used.
Leonardo Drew, Number 427, 2024. Photo: Jon Cancro
2. Sharing Knowledge and Being Transparent
For our 2024 exhibition, Acts of Resistance, we published an environmental statement online. By sharing our progress with our visitors and peers, we hold ourselves accountable. An important decision for this large international group show was to install work virtually with artists as opposed to flying them in for installation. We also produced all the artwork in London, instead of additional transportation.
We’re interested in looking at case studies from across the industry to see what we can learn. Here are a few that we thought might be useful to share:
- The team at Gander & White are trying to understand how to reduce the environmental impact of shipping, which plays such a fundamental role in the sector. Read more on Gallery Climate Coalition.
- Hauser + Wirth have explored the environmental impact of acrylic paint. 58% of microplastics leaked into the world’s oceans and waterways annually comes from paint.
- Circular Museum, a collaboration between MoMA’s Ambasz Institute and ART 2030, is a virtual panel-discussion series inviting artists, museum directors, curators, exhibition designers, and other museum practitioners from around the world to talk about their efforts to address the climate crisis through their work. Watch the discussions online.
- Quick tips for saving energy use for individuals at work, and throughout large public buildings.
- Artist Hendl Helen Mirra has created a Matter Rider. This document is an example of a formal exhibition agreement between artist and institution with the aim to limit exhibition waste and impact
3. Reusing Materials and Reducing Waste
Our Communities & Learning Team reuse unwanted materials and furniture for their projects, and we accept recycled and donated materials for our education programmes. In the SLG Bookshop, we recycle packaging for online orders and returns. The Programme team recycle exhibition build and materials from each show. In 2025, we worked with Resolve Collective to recycle a large amount of timber from Nairy Baghramian’s exhibition.
Pardip Kapil: Pelican Project, 2024 Photo: Lucien Ebongue
4. Sustainable Building Improvements
The SLG’s Main Gallery and Fire Station buildings date back to the late 1800s, and are both Grade II listed, so we are limited in how many structural changes we can make to them to improve energy efficiency. However, we can gather data, examine emissions and identify areas where we can make incremental improvements with targeted funding applications to make these changes.
In 2023, we received funding to replace the gas boiler in our Main Gallery with an air source heat pump. This switch helps reduce emissions and improve energy efficiency. We’re also working closely with our energy suppliers to better understand the environmental impact of our energy use, with plans to report on this in 2025-26.
In the future, we hope to replace single-glazed windows and overlay our listed roof. This will not only improve energy efficiency but will futureproof our buildings.
5. Staff Policies and Training
As part of our commitment to sustainability, we’ve enrolled in the Climate Perks scheme, which encourages staff to travel sustainably by offering up to two additional leave days for travel by ferry, bus, or train. Additionally, six members of our team are now certified Carbon Literate, and one staff member is trained to use the Carbon Literacy toolkit to provide internal training.
To find out more about our plans for future, read our environmental statement online.
We’d love to hear your thoughts. If you have any feedback or suggestions on how we can continue to improve our sustainability practices, or if you know of similar case studies we should explore, please get in touch: mail@southlondongallery.org