Victoria Miro Mayfair

General information

One of the largest commercial spaces in London, Victoria Miro Gallery represents established names such as film and installation artist Doug Aitken, and younger talent including Conrad Shawcross; and also works with the estates of artists such as, among others, the painter Alice Neel. The gallery represents two winners of the Turner Prize: Chris Ofili, who won the prize in 1998, and the 2003 winner Grayson Perry, as well as three Turner Prize nominees: Ian Hamilton Finlay, Peter Doig and Isaac Julien. Now in its 26th year, the gallery ethos remains consistent: to promote great and innovative artists and to nurture the best talent from the new generation of artists around the world.

Victoria Miro first opened her gallery in Cork Street, Mayfair in 1985. The gallery quickly earned acclaim for showing the work of established and emerging artists from the USA, Europe and Asia, and for nurturing the careers of young artists from the UK. In 2000 Victoria Miro Gallery relocated to a sensitively converted, 8,000-square-foot former furniture factory situated between Hoxton and Islington in northeast London. With exhibition spaces on two floors, the gallery is almost unique in London for having its own garden, a beautiful landscaped area overlooking a restored stretch of the Regent's Canal at Wenlock Basin which has been used to great effect for installations by gallery artists such as Yayoi Kusama.

In October 2006 the gallery expanded further by opening Victoria Miro 14, a 9,000-square-foot exhibition and viewing space open to the public for special exhibitions and projects.

This space, conceived by Claudio Silvestrin Architects and executed by the project architects Michael Drain Architects, comprises three core elements: galleries, viewing rooms, and offices, and domestic areas which create a series of inspirational environments in which to view and experience a wide variety of art. Victoria Miro Gallery II sits atop a refurbished Victorian building, its sculptural, minimalist form creating a dramatic approach to the building from the street. Illuminating the south façade through its six-metre-high windows is Ian Hamilton Finlay's elegiac neon installation, The Seas Leaves the Strawberries Waves (1990). Inside, a triple-height staircase leads to the main space which, through floor-to-ceiling windows, affords spectacular views of the city.

In October 2013, Victoria Miro returned to Mayfair to open a third space which occupies the ground floor of a prominent corner site intersected by St George and Maddox Streets, directly behind Sotheby's in Bond Street. As in Wharf Road, the design was conceived by Claudio Silvestrin and executed by Michael Drain.