Baltimore artist Dina Fiasconaro explores addiction and recovery in new installation

Dina Fiasconaro will open “Uh Huh Her” at Submersive HQ in Baltimore on July 10, using a four-channel video installation and live performance to confront substance use disorder through projected film, surveillance footage and immersive sound. The work is set to run July 10-12 at the immersive arts space at 3523 Buena Vista Ave. in Baltimore.

The project is rooted in Fiasconaro’s own recovery. She said she is in her 19th year of recovery and that it took nearly two decades before she felt ready to bring addiction-related stories into her art. Fiasconaro, who teaches film and moving image at Stevenson University, has built a career across documentary, narrative and experimental work, with projects that often explore mental health, family history and women’s experiences.

In Baltimore, the installation lands in the middle of a public-health crisis that has shaped neighborhoods, family life and emergency response for years. The Baltimore City Health Department says substance use disorder should be treated with dignity and respect, and that addiction has no distinct look. The Baltimore City Mayor’s Office of Overdose Response says its mission is to support people impacted by substance use with stigma-free, person-centered services.

The city’s overdose dashboard, launched May 8, 2023, is still built on finalized data through 2020, underscoring how slowly public records can catch up to the scale of the crisis. A prior Baltimore Fishbowl and New York Times-Baltimore Banner examination estimated nearly 6,000 overdose deaths in Baltimore over six years, a toll that still shapes the way residents experience loss, outreach and recovery.

Statewide, Maryland recorded 1,405 fatal overdoses in 2025, the lowest level in 10 years, according to the Maryland Department of Health. State officials said overdose deaths fell for a fourth straight year in provisional data announced in January 2026. Even with that decline, health officials continue to warn about medetomidine, a veterinary sedative that has been identified in Maryland’s illicit drug supply since July 2022 and is being reported mostly in the Northeastern United States, where the CDC says it can cause severe withdrawal symptoms.

That combination of personal history, digital imagery and public-health urgency gives “Uh Huh Her” a direct Baltimore relevance. It is staged in a city still wrestling with how to see people who use drugs, how to reduce stigma and how to respond before another name is added to the count.