Sculptor aims to capture ‘grace and dignity’ of late Queen for national memorial

A renowned sculptor who will create a statue of Queen Elizabeth II for her national memorial said he wants to craft a “compelling artwork of today” capturing the late monarch’s “grace and dignity”.

Martin Jennings, who has also portrayed the Queen Mother and the King in past works, said he is “absolutely thrilled” to be involved in the project and highlighted the “poignant link” between making representations of three generations of the royal family.

Mr Jennings will create the statue for a new civic space called Queen Elizabeth II Place at Marlborough Gate in St James’s Park, close to Buckingham Palace.

Architect Lord Foster won the bid to design the national memorial, which will also feature a new Prince Philip Gate on the other side of the park on Birdcage Walk with a statue of the Queen’s late husband, as well as a “family of gardens”, meandering paths and a new translucent, glass unity bridge.

In an interview with the PA news agency, Mr Jennings said: “At this stage we haven’t defined an idea for it.

“Intentionally it was planned that there would be discussions about how to represent her.

“I was appointed more on the basis of my past work than in response to a particular design.

“I think the commissioning body wanted to know that they were in safe hands, that I could deliver a monument to Queen Elizabeth that would respond to people’s needs, respond to the committee’s needs, respond to the aesthetics and the requirements of Foster + Partners.

“And of course this will garner attention from across the globe and people have strong feelings about the Queen and I will be going through a period of listening to not only what invested organisations and individuals want of it, but taking the temperature of how the populace at large might want to see this representation.”

He spoke of “purposefully avoiding” forming an image in his mind of what the statue could look like so early on into the project.

Mr Jennings went on: “We have historical precedence.

“There’s the Victoria Memorial next to Buckingham Palace at that end of The Mall, and the memorial further down the Mall towards Admiralty Arch of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother.

“And these offer some kind of precedent, but I would like to make something that has clearly been made now, I don’t want to make something that could be mistaken as having been put up 150 years ago or even 50 years ago.

“I’m sure this will be a wonderful new piece of work that also pays tribute to the longevity of Queen.

“She became Queen in the early 50s, that’s a long time ago, so this needs to be a compelling artwork of today, but suited to the whole period of her reign.”

Mr Jennings also created a bust of the Queen Mother in St Paul’s Cathedral and the first crowned coinage portrait of the King.

The 68-year-old also crafted statues of George Orwell outside BBC Broadcasting House, Philip Larkin in Hull, Mary Seacole in London’s St Thomas’ Hospital and the Women Of Steel in Sheffield.

He said: “There is a poignant link between making representations of three members of the royal family from three different generations.

“It almost feels like these projects are joined to each other, and let’s not forget, the Queen Mother was born in 1900 so this stretches historically across more than a century.”

He went on: “We have yet to find out how the project will work and I’m sure the King and the royal family will be very interested in how Queen Elizabeth is represented. I would want to have their approval.”

Mr Jennings said the statue needs to have “all the grandeur and dignity appropriate” for a ceremonial route.

He added: “In terms of the Queen herself, I think (the statue) would probably benefit from a certain amount of stillness.

“She was known for her grace, her decency and her restraint.

“And those are things I’d like to bear in mind when I’m making it.

“I make a sculpture as if only one person is going to see it, it may be a million people, but that’s a million individuals.

“And so it’s a direct communication with each of those single people.”

The proposal for the memorial will be subject to change, with the panel of committee members working with the team on the final design, which is expected to be unveiled in 2026, which would have been the late Queen’s 100th birthday year.

It has a provisional construction budget of between £23 million and £46 million excluding VAT.