{"id":16393,"date":"2015-08-04T12:28:27","date_gmt":"2015-08-04T11:28:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/?p=16393"},"modified":"2015-08-04T12:28:27","modified_gmt":"2015-08-04T11:28:27","slug":"thousands-of-pills-cradle-to-grave-by-pharmacopoeia-at-the-british-museum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/thousands-of-pills-cradle-to-grave-by-pharmacopoeia-at-the-british-museum\/","title":{"rendered":"Thousands of pills – Cradle to Grave by Pharmacopoeia at the British Museum"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Thousands<\/p>\n

Currently on display in the British Museum is a contemporary art installation called, ‘Cradle to Grave,’<\/em>\u00a0which sets out to explore our approach to health in Britain today.<\/p>\n

The work incorporates a lifetime supply of prescribed drugs knitted into two lengths of fabric, illustrating the medical stories of one woman and one man.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Thousands<\/p>\n

Each length contains over 14,000 drugs – which is the estimated average prescribed to every person in Britain in their lifetime.<\/p>\n

If you add in the pills we might buy over the counter, the total would rise to an astonishing 40,000 pills each.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Thousands<\/p>\n

The museum website<\/a> explains more about the work:<\/p>\n

Some of the treatments are common to both: each starts at birth with an injection of vitamin K and immunizations, and both take antibiotics and painkillers at various times. Other treatments are more specific. The woman takes contraceptive pills, and hormone replacement therapy in middle age.<\/p>\n

The man has asthma and hay fever when young, but enjoys good health until his fifties. He finally stops smoking after a bad chest infection when he is seventy. He is treated for high blood pressure for the last ten years of his life and has a heart attack and dies of a stroke in his seventies. He takes as many pills in the last ten years of his life as in the first sixty-six.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Thousands<\/p>\n

The installation dates from 2003, and was made by Susie Freeman, a textile artist, David Critchley, a video artist, and Dr Liz Lee, who is a GP, who collectively call themselves Pharmacopoeia.<\/p>\n

\"Thousands<\/p>\n

Find out more about the installation here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

British Museum
\nGreat Russell Street
\nLondon
\nWC1B 3DG<\/p>\n

Free admission
\nOpen daily 10.00\u201317.30
\nFridays: open until 20.30<\/p>\n

How to get there<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Currently on display in the British Museum is a contemporary art installation called, ‘Cradle to Grave,’\u00a0which sets out to explore our approach to health in Britain today. The work incorporates … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16394,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[194,17,193],"tags":[34,1185,1187,1186,1184,1188,10],"class_list":["post-16393","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-london-features","category-photos","category-places","tag-art","tag-british-museum","tag-contemporary-art","tag-contemporary-art-installation","tag-cradle-to-grave","tag-installation","tag-london"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/cradle-to-grave-british-museum-01.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pQI7P-4gp","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16393"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16393\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16400,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16393\/revisions\/16400"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.urban75.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}