A HYDE treatment and recovery service is thought to be the first in the country to have a resident artist.
ANEW, at Vernon House, has been the centre of a groundbreaking arts project.
Designer Joe Hartley made twice-weekly visits to the Edna Street service over five months as artist in residence.
Around 60 people, at all stages of recovery from substance use, collaborated with Joe to explore how meaningful creative activities can play an important role in recovery journeys.
Through hands-on sessions featuring everything from carpentry to ceramics and even chicken husbandry, Joe and ANEW have been pushing the boundaries of what it means to be creative and better connected.
A pioneering partnership project between ANEW, contemporary arts organisation Portraits of Recovery, and Manchester’s Castlefield Gallery, it blossomed into a free exhibition ANEW Way to Peel an Orange, which runs throughout September’s Recoverist Month until October 19.
The co-created show includes a diverse collection of new works that developed out of the residency.
Horsepower reimagines the Victorian botanical illustration as a six-metre-high spray-painted mural, while Pos and Negs explores how hand-crafted teapots made by the group inspired a series of black and white photographs, which then led to the creation of a further teapot generation.
Foxmaster is a chicken coop constructed from scrap metal. Whilst empty, it helps to tell the story of the ‘Recoverist chickens’ – two hatchlings that project participants helped to care for – via video.
For Joe, who lost his younger brother to substance use four years ago, the project holds huge personal significance.
“My brother never reached recovery so I haven’t seen this side before – the human potential for enormous personal growth and transformation,” he explained.
“It’s been a highly emotional but positive experience to see that struggles with substance use don’t always end the same way.”
‘Contemporary art has powerful role to play in recovery’
ANEW Way to Peel an Orange is part of Recoverist Month, which is delivered by Portraits of Recovery – a contemporary arts organisation that grew out of Oldham.
Throughout September, Portraits of Recovery is working with contemporary artists, galleries and museums to create pioneering programming that rewrites the narrative on substance use and recovery.
Engaging exhibitions, workshops, film screenings and more seek to empower people by challenging stigmatised perceptions of addiction and recovery through the lens of art.
Returning for its third instalment, this year will see exhibitions and events at venues including The Whitworth, HOME, Manchester Museum and Everyman Cinema.
With a professional background in the arts, Portraits of Recovery founder Mark Prest is himself a man in recovery. He said: “I’ve been in rehabs where the only creative activity was colouring by numbers.
“For me, that’s not art, and it’s certainly not going to help people redefine or progress their recovery journeys. Contemporary art, thoughtfully conceived, has a powerful role to play in recovery. And that’s what this project is about.”
John Platt, operations lead at ANEW, added: “People in recovery have creative minds. Through this whole experience I’ve seen nothing but happy, smiley faces.
“If I was asked to paint a picture with a brush, I’d die of boredom in nine seconds! But we were really attracted by the broadness of what this residency offered. Joe’s really expanded our ideas around what creativity and art can be and we will use this to continually improve our own recovery programmes.”