Spoilage: Speaking Up for Children of Drug Addicts
Bernadine Fox is a visual artist and writer with a BFA from
Emily Carr University who is raising her daughter’s child due to drug
addiction. She recently took the
Provincial Government to the Human Rights Tribunal in a precedent-setting case
over how the Ministry of Family and Child Services is abdicating their
responsibility to these children and, therefore, causing unnecessary
re-victimization. For those invested
with the power to protect children, drug addiction, trafficking, or
manufacturing does not equate to a child at risk despite living in grow-ups
full of mould and pesticides, exposed to toxic chemicals in meth labs or the
drug culture in general. Vancouver’s
Four Pillars Program recommends services for children, but the funding and
partners are still not in place. While their addicted parents are offered a
multitude of services such as needles, injection sites, and free treatment,
there are few to no services for their children who are literally being prepped
to become the next generation of addicts.
In this art exhibit, Fox allows the message to determine the medium and as such includes mixed media, painting, assemblage, photography, and text along with pieces that encompass sounds and smells. A soothing lullaby emanating from a crib mobile becomes a haunting sound when one realizes drug paraphernalia hangs alongside bright baby items. A nine-foot-by-four-foot painting, The Family Way, recreates a 1957 photograph of one family. The graffiti-like text recounts what has occurred to each of these “happy“ family members (mom, dad, and three young children) during the last fifty some years. Based on a true story, the fallout from the drug and alcohol abuse of the parents becomes not just evident but profound. An altered storybook Nana and the Kali-Alley Kitty recounts a compelling true story of a three-year-old child concerns for her mother who is a drug addict and has been missing for nine months. In It‘s Just a Party glasses filled with liquor are located on top of children‘s play blocks. Mommy and Me Kit is a reminiscent of the types of “works” kits put together by addicts except this one also includes a hypodermic needle from a child’s play set.
While not disputing the importance of harm reduction, in this exhibition Fox speaks out for those who are too often left out of the equation when it comes to these programmes: the children. If they are not a part of the equation then their needs remain invisible and they end up experiencing damaging and life-altering consequences. In short, they become its Spoilage.
In this art exhibit, Fox allows the message to determine the medium and as such includes mixed media, painting, assemblage, photography, and text along with pieces that encompass sounds and smells. A soothing lullaby emanating from a crib mobile becomes a haunting sound when one realizes drug paraphernalia hangs alongside bright baby items. A nine-foot-by-four-foot painting, The Family Way, recreates a 1957 photograph of one family. The graffiti-like text recounts what has occurred to each of these “happy“ family members (mom, dad, and three young children) during the last fifty some years. Based on a true story, the fallout from the drug and alcohol abuse of the parents becomes not just evident but profound. An altered storybook Nana and the Kali-Alley Kitty recounts a compelling true story of a three-year-old child concerns for her mother who is a drug addict and has been missing for nine months. In It‘s Just a Party glasses filled with liquor are located on top of children‘s play blocks. Mommy and Me Kit is a reminiscent of the types of “works” kits put together by addicts except this one also includes a hypodermic needle from a child’s play set.
While not disputing the importance of harm reduction, in this exhibition Fox speaks out for those who are too often left out of the equation when it comes to these programmes: the children. If they are not a part of the equation then their needs remain invisible and they end up experiencing damaging and life-altering consequences. In short, they become its Spoilage.