Date: Tuesday 26 November 2024
Time: 17:15 - 19:00
Location:
The Curve Lecture Theatre,
View map
About this event
For our Open Spaces event "Breathe. Air pollution and lung health through multiple lenses: Respiratory Medicine, Public Health and Fine Art" join artist Professor Dryden Goodwin, public health expert, Dr Richard Alderslade and respiratory physician, Dr Helen Meredith as they explore air pollution, respiratory health and the complex challenges of the need for clean air.
In this Open Spaces session, Professor Goodwin will share his wonderful work as a catalyst to an interdisciplinary discussion on air pollution and its impact on respiratory health with Dr Richard Alderslade and Dr Helen Meredith.
About Breathe
In 2012, artist, Dryden Goodwin, created Breathe, an animation of 100s of drawings of his then five year-old son inhaling and exhaling, which was projected on the roof of St Thomas’ Hospital opposite the Houses of Parliament. Ten years later, Dryden revisited the subject, for ‘Breathe:2022’, making drawings of six Londoners who bear witness to the continued impact of air pollution, through their activism, bodies and breath.
This year the project moved to Lahore as part of Lahore Biennale LB03 Of Mountains and Seas. As Pakistan’s second biggest city, Lahore takes the lead in the poor air quality index with a score of 299 – just two points short of ‘hazardous’. For Breathe:Lahore Dryden grew the artwork making 230 pencil drawings of Pakistan’s leading clean air campaigner, Abid Omar, which were displayed, alongside drawings of the other activists as posters, digital billboards, and projections across the smog-choked city of Lahore and an installation at Lahore’s historic Bradlaugh Hall, showcasing the completed animation comprised of 1,617 drawings.
For the Breathe series of projects, Dryden has worked with the arts and science organisation Invisible Dust who are the producers.
About the speakers
Dr Richard Alderslade
Dr Alderslade has worked for forty years in public health, national and local health administration, research and higher education in the United Kingdom, and for ten years in humanitarian and development international health.
He has worked in the United Kingdom and abroad including posts with the UK Medical Civil Service, the National Health Service and World Health Organisation.
Since 2013 he has been a Senior Teaching Fellow in Public Health at St George’s Hospital, University of London. He also teaches public and global health subjects at New York University in the United States.
Professor Dryden Goodwin
Dryden Goodwin is a professor at the Slade School of Fine Art, UCL.
Professor Goodwin’s work is defined by a rich dialogue between drawing, animation, photography, film and sound. He has consistently focused on the human figure, questioning the portrait form. His work offers a speculative vision that considers the uncertain processes of looking and representing, both in relation to what is experienced and what is seen. He considers the dynamics of human relationships—whether between strangers, within communities, in work environments, or among families and friends—addressing both individual and collective identities. He also explores urgent environmental and societal issues.
Professor Goodwin has produced several solo exhibitions and received film festival nominations for his work. His work is held in public collections including MoMA New York, the Tate Collection, National Portrait Gallery and the Science Museum.
Dr Helen Meredith
Dr Helen Meredith is a consultant and respiratory physician at St George’s Hospital, where she has worked for the last 9 years. She is the group lead there leading the team providing respiratory secondary care for Wandsworth and Merton as well as tertiary services across South West London.
She holds the degrees of MA (Cantab) from Cambridge University and MBBS from the Royal Free. She competed her respiratory training in hospitals across North East London seeing the impact of health inequalities on her patients there.
She has an interest in environmental pollution because it impacts on all aspects of respiratory health as well as the impact on our children and the community around us.
Watch a recording of this event
Contact Details
If you have additional questions, please contact the Open Spaces Team.