- Desert Island Cloud

In collaboration with Voice of Aiko, Arts Council England, and charities REST, MIND & APRIL, Enya Belak Gupta unveils a powerful new film to help tackle the global prescription drug crisis. Prescription Dream is a slick and stylish documentary that illustrates with chilling insight the terrible impact prescription drugs can have.

The tense, unnerving tone employed throughout represents the helplessness and confusion of dependency sufferers. The film will be released online on Wednesday 17th October 2018 with the aim of generating cultural discourse around this pressing issue. Working with Stakk Media and partner charities, the Prescription Dream will be released with a weekly vlog series sharing people’s personal stories of their experiences with prescription drugs. Voice of Aiko is also running musical workshops with those affected as part of the campaign.

Voice of Aiko is a creative collective of musicians, filmmakers, and artists joining forces to campaign for real societal change. Aiko’s first project Prescription Dream sees founder Calista Kazuko collaborate with fellow musicians Samim, Miguel Toro, and Jack Brown and filmmaker Enya Belak Gupta to spotlight an ongoing global prescription drug epidemic. In England alone, there are an estimated 1.5 million people suffering from medically prescribed benzodiazepine dependency, and more than 1 million patients are taking dependence-forming drugs unnecessarily. Antidepressants are also a major problem, with statistics showing that roughly 50 Americans die from prescription painkiller overdoses every day. In partnership with charities REST, MIND & APRIL, Aiko’s Prescription Dream project will raise awareness and open dialogue on this devastating issue. The campaign includes a series of musical workshops with Let’s All Create which use art to help heal those who have been affected. Voice of Aiko is grateful to be supported with public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England.