Art and sculpture exhibition explores sugar consumption and its place within daily lives.
An art exhibition and networking evening, hosted by Action on Salt and Sugar, brought together public and sector audiences to explore sugar’s role in society and the wider food system. 
Delivered in collaboration with Queen Mary University of London (QMUL) and artist, Lindsay Servian, the event welcomed a range of public health professionals, researchers and community members for an evening at QMUL’s award-winning venue, The Neuron Pod in London.
The exhibition, Beneath Sweetness, presented a diverse collection of artworks and sculptures created by Servian that examined sugar from a fresh and thought-provoking perspective. Visitors were invited to reflect on its place in everyday life, its cultural significance, and its role within the wider food system.
The pieces ranged widely in theme and approach, with some drawing on the history of sugar production, including its links to the transatlantic slave trade and legacy. Others focused on contemporary life, for example, an installation recreating a child’s birthday party exploring the normalisation of sugar consumption from an early age and how it remains embedded in social and cultural occasions.
Similarly, a series of posters demonstrated how public perceptions can shift when warning labels - similar to those used on tobacco packaging - are applied to high sugar items, prompting discussion around future possible public health approaches.
The event offered a valuable space for discussion, with attendees sharing ideas on how these wider social and cultural factors could help shape future health interventions. It reinforced the message that sugar consumption is a multifactorial issue, not shaped by individual choice alone, but by the environments people live in.
We were delighted to see such strong engagement from across the sector and would extend out thanks to everyone that attended, as well as our partners and team who made the event possible.
Photo credit: Lindsay Servian
