The study of tropical medicine was born in Liverpool. It is a history running in tandem with that of colonialism, international travel and economies of exploration and exploitation. Tropical Medicine has subsequently developed into the study of contemporary global health concerns from disease to pandemics. The language of the virus has itself migrated into the language of ideas, global trends travel through duplication and replication and today notions of the other are challenged through collective intelligence built by communication networks, international travel and migration as well as by developments in science and technology. Tropical medicine explores human histories and myths, human futures and the futures of medicine.
 
This proposal is to create an environmental artwork; a tropical art -garden housed in the grounds of the Sir Alfred Jones Hospital in Garston, Liverpool. 'Tropical Medicine' offers sanctuary from a medical de-humanizing clinical environment and opens questions about our contemporary view of nature; human, plant and animal.
 
Gardening is one of the most ancient examples of human cultivation of ‘nature’.  Through transforming our experience of humidity, light, temperature, sound, smell, feel and architecture this garden creates a tropical synthesis – a surprising twilight world that will lift the spirit, reduce anxiety and engage the mind, providing an alternative focus to take us to an other place.
 
Made with multiple partners from the creative, scientific and local communities, this work expresses an innovative, integrated and collaborative approach to creation. The melding of the artworks and garden redefines the notion of container and content and collectively manifests topics such as “natural process” in contrast to the regeneration systems of modern medical science. Ideas of nationhood, cultivation, augmentation, perfection and normality are addressed.   How do our attitudes to imitation and manipulation differ when set in context of human biology or the larger ecosystem?
 
'Tropical medicine' will be a unique local and international landmark.The combination in Merseyside of Foundation for Art and Creative Technology, The Liverpool school of Tropical Medicine and the new Biomedical Research Center,  is already synthesizing a new approach to art and medicine. The reinvigoration of the community through innovative linking of the allotments, the Garston market and the hospital’s community cafe with educational projects will provide a ground breaking trans-generational opportunity for health, wellbeing education, economic regeneration and tourism for one of the most deprived wards of the UK.