Medical Packaging

This Summer we are proud to exhibit Medical Packaging, by the fabulous Bini Atkinson!

The exhibition opens on the 25th June, and everybody is welcome to come and celebrate the amazing works of Bini. If you can’t join us for the opening we encourage everyone to come during our regular studio hours - Monday to Thursday, and Saturdays 10am to 3pm.

“I have an eclectic creative working history. A degree in Fine Art, was such a versatile qualification and found me working within the Creative Industries as a Photographic Retoucher and at the BBC as a Set Draughtsperson.”

”The majority of my time however has been spent part time teaching in Secondary/ Further/ Higher education. The remaining time, enabling me to work on my own creative practice and Art Residencies within the NHS, Probation Services, Outreach work. Charities, Theatre and Dance Companies.”

”Often the work was participant lead, reflecting their interaction and experiences through creative work. Exhibitions often took the form of group engagement or group themed work.”

The content and context of my work is to interpret the experience of physical health, through the process of re working and manipulating ephemeral raw materials, in the form of medical packages/ blister packs/ patient information leaflets. At times these are combined with digital images of scans and other medical imaging. Current work is a record of working with individuals, who offered up during 2020-21, their empty medical packages/ blister packs/ patient information leaflets and significant words or phrases they wish to share publicly, associated with their long term medical conditions.

The participant contributors entrust me to stitch or print their words or phrases into or onto manipulated and altered packaging reflecting their condition. I rarely meet these participants. The work is based purely on trust, to the extent that I never Google participants condition or medication, I work wholly on the information they provide. This is a humbling, intriguing and respectful creative activity. While the work is entirely my own creative endeavour and interpretation, I have a responsibility to reflect the collaboration in a truthful creative expression/ outcome.

The work at present has only been shared through a virtual platform and with the full consent of the participant contributors. This exhibition will be its first airing. It was always an aim of mine to be able to have a physical exhibition and for a book, recording the work, phrases and associated written content from individuals, to be offered as a way of a" Thank You" to them for their contribution and honesty in sharing their personal condition.

For more information visit https://www.globearts.org.uk/events/medical-packaging