24 Gscene Aids crisis that was raging through New York. Haring’s work flowed through the New York subways and art galleries alike and became an important visual voice of the Aids crisis. Haring’s style of using bright colours and playful characters was, unlike the UK Government’s Don’t Die of Ignorance slogan, perfect for spreading the message about the need for safer sex and to alert everyone without scaring the bejeezers out of them. Instead, Haring’s style drew people in and provoked positive discussion about safer sex. I was one of the many people wearing his safer sex T-shirts, further spreading the message.
More to Me Than HIV
Glenn Stevens explains the new project and looks back at memorable and striking HIV/Aids campaigns over the years ) Over the years many of the HIV/Aids campaigns have made use of striking images and memorable catchphrases to keep the topic of the disease in the public eye. The success of these was the trigger for the creation of a new HIV campaign with the main objective of relegating to the past misconceptions of what it means to live with an HIV diagnosis, and to break down the stigma many of those living with HIV have experienced in the past and present.
slogan blasted across billboards and when you popped the television on there was the same image, with John Hurt’s gravelly voice reiterating the same message. How effective this campaign was is still up for debate, but for many this is the image they recall when we talk about Aids. Unsurprisingly no one had the UK Government tombstones blazed across their chest. Perhaps the most universally recognisable symbol, particularly during the build-up to WAD, is the Red Ribbon. The red ribbon symbol started in 1988 when a group of New York artists came together to create art in response to the Aids crises.
The project is called More to Me Than HIV, inviting those living with an HIV-positive diagnosis to submit three personal images alongside three empowering words to show there’s More to Me Than HIV. To mark World Aids Day 2020 (WAD), here are some of the other visual campaigns and symbols that have kept HIV/Aids in the public eye...
For those of us who grew up in the 1980s, the most enduring image from that time will be the terrifying tombstones telling us: “Don’t die of Ignorance”. Every household had a leaflet through their door, you could not walk down the street without seeing the same
Around the same time an American campaign group called Act Up (Aids Coalition to Unleash Power) was formed, with one of the founders being the renowned political Aids campaigner, Larry Kramer. From the very beginning the group understood the power of the image and used many striking symbols and slogans along with direct action protests to get their voices heard. Set up in New York in 1987, Act Up had a collective of artists under the banner Gran Fury. Perhaps its most iconic image was that of Silence = Death, with the pink triangle (a symbol used during the Nazi Holocaust to identify homosexual men, but later reclaimed by the political gay community) along with the factual statement at the time, Silence = Death. The ‘silence’ was not just about the silence from the politicians, but from the many people living with HIV who felt they could not speak up about their HIV+ status through fear of the stigma that was rife then and, to a degree, still is for many across the globe. At the same time graffiti/pop art artist Keith Haring was making a statement about the
When the group was joined by Marc Happel, a costume designer by trade, he brought the idea of using a red ribbon after being inspired by the yellow ribbons tied round trees in support the military personnel serving in the Gulf war. From the very start the red ribbon was an easy way to allow people to show their support for WAD. In the early 1990s, for a short while a new trend began with some gay men living with HIV having a biohazard image tattoo. For
