Worldwide, the AIDS pandemic has resulted in the death of 35 million people in less than 40 years. In the 80s and 90s, AIDS particularly devastated New York City’s creative community — claiming the lives of visionaries like Keith Haring, Robert Mapplethorpe, Halston, Marlon Riggs, Arthur Russell, and Felix Gonzalez-Torres to name only a few. The crisis not only resulted in urgent and direct political action against a neo-conservative government that refused to acknowledge it; AIDS also inspired some of the most enduring works of art, film, and music to emerge in the 20th century.
Today, 36.7 million people live with HIV/AIDS and the stigma that accompanies a positive diagnosis. While it’s important to recognize progress and remember those we have lost, it’s crucial we keep fighting for a cure, and the creation of a more humane society for everyone living with HIV/AIDS. If you’ve memorized “Brother to Brother” from re-watching Riggs’s seminal Tongues Untied so frequently, or have a cavity from visiting Gonzalez-Torres’s candy sculptures so often, here are five next-generation AIDS art-activist projects to contemplate this World AIDS Day.
Compulsive Practice: Since 1988, Visual Aids has used art as its weapon of choice in encouraging dialogue around HIV/AIDS, and the intersecting issues that contribute to its persistence today. Today marks its 27th Day Without Art, and the launch of a new film piece, Compulsive Practice. The work compiles videos created by nine artists and activists who “live with their cameras as one way to manage, reflect upon, and change how they are deeply affected by HIV/AIDS,” explains Visual Aids. Though their strategies differ (some made personal video diaries, others documented public protests), Compulsive Practice considers common themes of obsessive, habitual artmaking methods that span over 30 years. The film screens tonight at the New Museum, and will be followed by a panel discussion featuring three participating artists: Carol Leigh, Luna Luis Ortiz, and James Wentzy. This weekend, screenings and discussions will be presented at the Brooklyn Museum and Studio Museum in Harlem. For a full list of New York City screening venues and times (including NYU and Parsons), visit Visual Aids here.
Eastpak Artists Studio x Designers Against AIDS: “People are dying, and as they die their absence assumes a peculiar resonance, as if so many children playing in a forest vanished one by one, until the few who remained suddenly stopped to listen to the stillness, and to wonder where their friends had gone,” Michael Shnayerson wrote in 1987 for a Vanity Fair piece, titled “One by One.” Shnayerson explored how the AIDS affected the fashion industry and visual arts, particularly in New York City. For the past six years, Eastpak Artists Studio has tapped some of today’s most celebrated designers to create special edition backpacks benefitting Designers Against AIDS, a Belgium-based non-profit organization creating AIDS awareness through pop cultural collaboration. Jean Paul Gaultier and Walter Van Beirendonck have contributed in past years, though 2016’s roster of participating designers is perhaps the most major to date: Vetements, Jacquemus, House of Holland, and many more are all in the mix. “Today’s youth don’t have the messages we had in the 80s and 90s. Many are not aware of how many incredible people died due this disease and how millions of people worked relentlessly with governments for countries to take this seriously as a worldwide epidemic,” Kenzo creative directors Carol Lim and Humberto Leon told i-D of their Eastpak collaboration recently. “Don’t forget about this disease, too many people died for you to be here today.”
The Positive Project: After being diagnosed with HIV on his 22nd birthday, London College of Fashion student Jacob Alexander founded The Positive Project, an app combining fashion and technology to create a safe space and resource network for those living with HIV. “The mentality behind my app is to keep the wellbeing of people living with HIV to the best that it can be. At the moment, there’s a lot about preventing or medicating it, but it’s almost like you get forgotten about once you get to the medication stage,” Alexander told i-D earlier this year. Users can apply to receive a Positive Project package, which includes an embroidered t-shirt. Once received, they upload a selfie in the tee, which is geotagged on a map with a + sign. The idea is not only to spread positivity and solidarity around the globe, but to connect users with resources in their area. “I was slowly realizing that a lot of people were asking me what appeared to me to be crazy, uneducated questions, but I couldn’t be mad at them because they were only asking to the limit of their education.” Read Alexander’s fearless full interview to get educated, and learn more about The Positive Project here.
Red Hot: Established in 1989, Red Hot is one of the most widely recognized AIDS art-activism organizations. Its inaugural benefit compilation album, Red Hot + Blue — which featured Neneh Cherry, Sinead O’Connor, k.d. Lang, U2, and Annie Lennox paying tribute to the music of Cole Porter — sold over a million copies, raising funds for organizations like AMFar and ActUp. It was followed in the 90s by dance, country, alternative, indie rock, hip-hop, and Latin tributes. But Red Hot’s work is far from over, and most recently, the organization celebrated the life and work of one of New York City’s most cherished avant-garde composers, Arthur Russell. The prolific experimental cellist collaborated with Philip Glass, David Byrne, and disco titans like Larry Levan before he died of AIDS-related complications in 1992. In 2014, Red Hot compiled a tribute to Russell’s emotional and enduring music that featured covers by José González, Scissor Sisters, and Robyn. Blood Orange frontman Devonté Hynes was among the most active participants in the project, hybridizing Russell’s “Tower of Meaning” with his NYC nightlife staple, Loose Joints’s “Is It All Over My Face.” He performed these renditions at the Red Bull Music Academy, and spoke widely about why Russell remains one of his heroes. “The music feels super New York, even still, because it feels like the energy of streets in the daytime, Alphabet City, East Village, and nighttime, partying and being free,” Hynes told Vogue. Learn more about Red Hot’s work here.
PosterVirus x AIDS Action Now: Over the past five years, PosterVirus has created street art campaigns with artists and activists to consider issues related to HIV and Hepatitis C, including incarceration and criminalization, public health, sex work, stigma, mental health, poverty, racism, and homophobia. Artists and PosterVirus organizers Jessica Whitbread and Alex McClelland recently told i-D about covering the streets of Toronto with 2,500 posters about “compassion and about claiming our sexual autonomy” this World AIDS Day. “In some communities there have been small victories, personal shifts, and healing, but in others women living with HIV are sterilized, or positive people are arrested and incarcerated for non-disclosure,” the pair explained. “What must be remembered is that no matter what UNAIDS or the global response might say, AIDS is not over — it is not the End of AIDS. In fact it is far from the end. And even if there was a magic pill that would cure everyone that is currently living with HIV, it will take more than that to cure the inequalities that drive HIV epidemics.” Learn more about AIDS Action Now’s work here.
Related: Why World AIDS Day matters
Credits
Text Emily Manning