Presentation of £4000 Grant for Orang-utans

Presentation of £4000 Grant for Orang-utans

Anna-Louise was joined by wildlife sculptor Casey Banwell to  present a cheque to Dr Ian Singleton OBE, Director of the Sumatran Orang-utan Conservation Programme (SOCP).

Ian, who has spent nearly 30 years working with and studying orang-utans and their conservation, travelled from Sumatra to meet Anna-Louise and Casey at Pollyanna’s private gallery in Derbyshire.

During our Art of Conservation exhibition celebrating 25 years of the Pollyanna Pickering Foundation visitors were greeted at the door by ‘Longarm’ a life size bronze of an orang-utan created by Casey. The sculpture was at the exhibition as part of an awareness raising tour starting from Casey’s studio in Buckinghamshire, ultimately finishing when he will be installed in The Haven sanctuary in Sumatra, home to the real-life model.  Longarm’s journey is being documented at every stage, and will ultimately be made into a documentary for Netflix.

The Longarm sculpture is based on Leuser,  a real life orang-utan who is a resident at the SOCP Haven and Rehabilitation Centre in north Sumatra.  At the end of 2024 several major landslides struck the centre and caused extensive damage to key infrastructure, including the main veterinary clinic and multiple orang-utan enclosures. The scale of the destruction to the centre was immense.

We are delighted to announce that our grant has been used to purchase materials start to rebuilding – with strongly enhanced infrastructure to better withstand any future natural disasters. Construction work is already well underway on the new infant’s rescue and care unit.

Thanking the Foundation for the grant, Ian said that the extreme weather event “highlights the increasing challenges faced by conservation programmes like SOCP. The damage was immense, but with grants like this, and support from the global community, the critical work of orang-utan conservation will continue. Rebuilding now means creating a stronger, safer foundation for the future—one that ensures orang-utans have the chance to thrive in the wild.”