OUTCAST REGISTRATION: an archive of imprisoned female drug users' biographies

Background: Since the pilot project in 2004, 29 incarcerated, drug-addicted women have participated in my arts-based research projects, spanning 6 countries in Central Europe thus far. Their biographies, written and recorded by themselves, are collated, and contextualised with the frequently disproportionate penal consequences of their addiction, to problematise the general notion of the marginalisation of female junkies as a negligible social phenomenon. My multi-year projects are conducted in cooperation with partners from art, science and politics in European prisons and treatment centres, and aim to make the participating women's lives visible to the public and to uncover and question the conditions in societal systems that are unthinkingly taken for granted and accepted. Methods: Matrix Method: The Matrix Method, building sentences by selecting words from a catalogue of 260 basic terms, enables participants to examine their biographies objectively. This protocol-like approach is experienced as a kind of legitimisation of their life’s stories, which is often linked to an urgent need to communicate it and make it a public concern. Visualisations: The matrix-based biographical documentation makes it possible to analyse both cause and effect of the addiction(s) and the resulting consequences thereof. Based on the criminal record of a participant, contrasted with an inventoried list of all crimes done to them, diagrams and tables are created to visualise the level of punishment in relation to the crimes committed by and against them. Comparative Insight: The growing number of biographical files enables a European comparison of individual, societal, legal and cultural similarities and differences in the immense impact of dependencies and the ramifications thereof.   Results: Art intervention and empirical data collection prove to be effective and complementary investigative methods that can be applied in an interdisciplinary context. Within the framework of existing and new contacts, a large-scale network is being established with expertise that will promote and enrich arts-based research on possibilities for socio-political interventions in the long term. The idea for showing previous findings and engaging the visitors of LisbonAddicitons24 visitors is a radical yet simple one: For one hour per day, each e-poster screen will display one biographical sentence for a full hour, with a short informative text about the project and an invitation for future collaborations on project implementations in the lower part of the screen.  The screens therefore individually and collectively transform into an exhibition space, inviting the viewers to discover the project sentence by sentence and as a result are a platform for a public intervention by showcasing one of 686 biographical sentences of drug-addicted, incarcerated women. A bold statement, both visually and figuratively, by making the lives of the women who have participated visible to the public.