We’re delighted to share that Portraits of Recovery has been nominated for a Manchester Culture Award in the category of Excellence in Creative Health and Wellbeing for our year-long project, Let’s Talk About Chemsex by artist Harold Offeh.
Commissioned by Portraits of Recovery, in partnership with Manchester Art Gallery and Brighter Sounds, Let’s Talk About Chemsex explored the complexities of consent, intimacy, and desire within the LGBTQ+ community, opening brave and honest conversations around Chemsex and wellbeing. The project sought to challenge stigma and silence by creating space for understanding, reflection, and collective creativity.
Launched during Manchester Pride 2023, the project began with a 90s-style radio show-inspired installation, a playful yet powerful nod to Salt-N-Pepa’s pioneering tracks Let’s Talk About Sex and Let’s Talk About AIDS, which helped destigmatise conversations about sexuality in popular culture. Building on that spirit, Offeh invited participants to co-create work that would continue this legacy of openness, creativity, and care.
Over the following year, Let’s Talk About Chemsex developed through a series of artist-led workshops, with participants collaboratively exploring experiences of sex on chems. These workshops culminated in the creation of a double A-side vinyl, Anticipation <—> Anxiety and A Warm Hug, produced in partnership with Brighter Sound and music producer Niall O’Conghaile (The Niallist). The resulting music is both personal and collective: an expression of honesty, bravery, and intimacy that reclaims space for compassion and healing.
The project culminated in March 2024 with a one-day, queer-led takeover of Manchester Art Gallery, featuring performances, installations, and live works by an extraordinary line-up of artists: Valentin Ranger (Paris/London), Ghetto Fabulous (Manchester), mandla (Manchester), Daniel Rey (London), and Sam Cottington (London/Frankfurt).
Each artist responded to the project’s central themes through their own practice, from Rey’s participatory live artwork Collective Cuddles to mandla’s intimate choreo-poem and Ghetto Fabulous’ electric freestyle performance. Together, they offered audiences a celebratory, challenging, and deeply moving look at LGBTQ+ intimacy and relationships, through the lens of recovery and resilience.
The nomination for Let’s Talk About Chemsex recognises not only the creativity and courage of everyone involved, but also the power of the arts to support health, recovery, and community wellbeing. It affirms the importance of giving voice to lived experience, and of using creativity as a tool for connection and change.
We’re incredibly proud of this nomination and grateful to Harold Offeh, our collaborating artists, and all the participants who shared their stories, creativity, and trust. Let’s Talk About Chemsex stands as a testament to what can happen when art, recovery, and community come together with compassion and purpose.