Heroin bodies is a collaborative project exploring new ways of communicating the science of opioid overdose and addiction.
Heroin Bodies is a self-initiated collaborative project between myself and a science researcher, Basak Tas. It was funded by King’s College London and supported by Release, leading charity in the UK with expertise on drugs and drugs law.
Opioid overdose deaths are currently the highest on record in the UK and globally. The causes for this are not fully understood and largely misrepresented in the public discourse.
This project aims to contextualise the scientific aspects of opioid use and overdose to wider audiences. Mortality, drug use and addiction are intimate, taboo, and difficult to talk about. This project explores the boundaries of interpretation and communication of academic research in the public domain, in order to create space for an open discussion and challenge perceptions around this complex and often controversial issue.
The concept, content and design of this multi-sensory installation were based on a series of in-depth conversations with Basak, and personal research over a number of weeks in June and July 2017.
heroinbodies.com / galiarybitskaya.com
